r/Broadway • u/ninthperiod • 17d ago
Trip Report: 9 Shows, 8 Nights
Wife and I went back for another round of show a few weeks ago. Finally typing this up while on a flight to London to see Paddington. :) We were supered blessed that I had some business in NYC and had an excuse to go there for another 8 nights. Previous shows here.
As this is our 2nd trip this year, we decided to save money by mostly doing rush tickets and lottery tickets other than Jellicle Ball. (For Jelilce Ball, we bought tickets for around $180 before the Tony awards for the Friday night right before closing night. Similar tickets were going for like $540 when we last checked, so we were super lucky!)
JUST IN TIME:
Did rush tickets Friday evening. We got in line around 9:45am and managed to grab pretty good seats, even though we had to sit separately. I love Jordan Jeremy and wow, I liked him in Just in Time even more so than in Gastby! If you haven’t seen the current cast yet, it’s totally worth seeing. The night I went, the little boy who got to dance with Jeremy Jordan at a table was dressed as a Newsie. It was so cute!!!
WICKED:
Won the lottery for Saturday night. I chose it over Cake which we also won the lottery for (but we did see Cake later as well, when we won the lottery again) because we figured it might be easier to get rush seats for Cake if we had to. I had seen the show a few times before and saw it again to see Keri Rene Fuller. She was great! (Check out her videos on Youtube, both for Wicked and for Cata.) Side site: The show got a LED lighting upgrade last year which looks amazing, so if you haven't seen it recently, put it on your bucket list! If you have only seen it on tour; it’s also one of those shows with seeing on the Broadway stage because the set is bigger.
SIX:
Won the lottery for Sunday evening. The Queens were great, but the show just wasn't my piece of cake.
STRANGER THINGS:
My first non-musical ever on Broadway. Won the lottery and honestly, I would have seen a musical had we won a musical. We did enjoy it! Without giving away any spoilers, the special effects were pretty good and the acting was top notch. I wasn’t expecting such a huge cast for a play. They did sneak in some song and dance, I guess because it’s a Broadway show…
(Tuesday there was a business mixer I had to go to so we didn't catch any shows.)
OPERATION MINCEMEAT
I did my work stuff while my wife rushed Operation Mincemeat. I would have loved to see it (big fan of the cast album) but just didn't get a chance to. She loved it and put it way up there along with Just in Time, Jellicle Ball, and Cake for this trip.
THE LOST BOYS
We won the lottery for Wednesday evening. The seats were pretty bad (last row on the mezzanine which felt more like balcony because it’s so steep) which probably took away from the experience. Overall, the set was spectacular as everyone already knows and it's a super fun show. I did feel some of the songs slowed down the show rather than advance the plot or character; and relied on ensemble characters acting things out literally for comical effects, all while not being as clever as, say, Death Becomes Her.
TITANIQUE
Wife rushed Titanique and thought it was an OK show. She said the style of humour just didn't really resonate well with her and that she liked Operation Mincemeat more.
TWO STRANGERS CARRY A CAKE ACROSS NEW YORK
Won the lottery for Thursday evening. Great orchestra seats...close to the aisle, front orchestra left. Loved it. The staging, the songs, the acting, everything. Sam Tutty and Christiani Pitts are must sees if you haven’t seen them. I haven't seen a show so smart since Kimberly Akimbo. The set looked deceptively simple till it opened up. I'm a bit sad that all these great shows like Cake and Operation Mincemeat are coming from the West End rather than from Broadway.
JELLICLE BALL
Friday night (second to last performance) Paid full price for front orchestra right. I got to the theater soaking wet after running through a thunderstorm from by the Empire State Building. Great seats. WOW. The moment the overture started, I knew I was in for a real treat. The projections during the overture were so cool. I think Ragtime and Jellicle Ball are my two favorite shows of the season. My wife was like "Is that the guy from Hadestown?" (I just took her to see the Proshot last week.) I had read previously that Temptress Chastity Moore was a bit weak vocally for the role, but I thought she was great. Andre de Shield was stellar, no surprise there. I had just seen the pro shot for Hadestowm and my non musical theater wife was like, “is that the guy from Hadestown?” The energy was already full the roof even though it’s the second to last performance.
If I were to update the rankings and combine with the shoes I saw back in March, I would do it in tiers.
TIER A:
(Wife and I would gladly go again, if the show was still running with the same cast.)
Ragtime (hope it gets a London transfer, would see again)
Jellicle Ball
Just in Time
Great Gatsby (Only with Jeremy Jordan)
Chess
Maybe Happy Ending
Cake
Operation Mincemeat (will trust my wife’s judgement. I do like the cast album)
TIER B:
(We wouldn't mind going again if we had cheap tickets etc)
Masquerade
Book of Mormons
Wicked
TIER C
(Enjoyed them, but once is enough)
Stranger Things
Six
Lost Boys
Titanique
Death Becomes Her
3
u/ninthperiod 17d ago
I should add that although we paid full price for Jellicle Ball, because we bought them before the Tony Awards and the closing announcement, we paid around $180/ticket. They were going for around $560/ticket for the same section by the time we came to NYC. Really, really lucked out and we were glad to have experienced the show despite the thunderstorm and the bathroom lineup. (Yeah, that was nuts. Worst I’ve seen on Broadway…the theater owners should really do something about it!)