As the ban on mass gatherings—which officially began March 12 as mandated by Governor Andrew Cuomo—continues, check in below for the latest postponements, cancellations, and scheduling updates for Off-Broadway theatres.
We’ll also regularly update with companies’ alternative programming, which includes online readings and live streams, virtual workshops, behind-the-scene exclusives, social groups, and much more.
If you’d like to support an institution, visit each organization’s website for instructions on how to make a donation.
READ: Exactly What Does It Mean to an Off-Broadway Theatre to Cancel a Production?
59E59 THEATERS
Season: All live programming has been suspended through June 2020.
Alternative programming: Two shows from the canceled Brits Off-Broadway festival (set to begin April 14) are available for streaming: Breach’s production of It’s True, It’s True, It’s True, about the 1612 trial of Agostino Tassi for the rape of Baroque painter Artemisia Gentileschi, streams on YouTube through the end of April; and Alan Bennett’s The Habit of Art is available via Original Theatre Company.
ARS NOVA
Season: The remainder of its 2019-2020 season is canceled, which includes the world premiere of Heather Christian’s Oratorio for Living Things and the 13th annual ANT Fest.
ATLANTIC THEATER COMPANY
Season: The remainder of the 2019–2020 season is postponed until further notice, including the Sarah Silverman, Adam Schlesinger, and Joshua Harmon musical The Bedtwetter (to begin April 25) and Ethan Coen’s A Play is a Poem (to begin May 14).
Alternative programming: Watch a scene from She Persisted, The Musical, which was cut short when theatres closed in March.
BROOKLYN ACADEMY OF MUSIC
Season: Theatre, dance, music, and visual art events are canceled through June 30.
Alternative programming: BAM is offering curated digital content in a series called Love from BAM, featuring archived performances and talks, as well as films streamed through partnerships with distributors. Visit BAM.org for information.
CLASSIC STAGE COMPANY
Season: The final production of the season, Assassins, has been postponed. CSC intends to resume rehearsals and present the production in the coming months.
Alternative programming: CSC moves its discussion series, Classic Conversations, online for free viewing. Airing live on Thursdays at 6 PM on YouTube and Facebook (and available to view afterwards on these platforms and Instagram IGTV), the lineup includes Brandon Uranowitz (April 16), Will Swenson (April 23), Adam Chanler-Berat (April 30), and Tavi Gevinson (May 7).
CLUBBED THUMB
Season: The 2020 Summerworks season, originally scheduled for late spring and summer, has been postponed to the fall. New dates for the six-week festival, featuring three world premieres, to be announced.
Alternative programming: Follow along on Clubbed Thumb’s Instagram stories for a retrospective of the last 24 years.
ENSEMBLE STUDIO THEATRE
Season: Live programming is suspended, including Brittany K. Allen’s play Redwood, which was set to begin in April and will be rescheduled.
THE FLEA THEATRE
Season: All live performances are canceled until further notice. This impacts the world premiere of Taylor Mac’s The Fre, which was in performances, Flea Fridays, and Sara Farrington’s Cosmicomics, amongst other spring programming.
Alternative programming: The Flea’s artistic director Niegel Smith has teamed up with Mac, Kristin Marting, Morgan Jenness, Emily Morse, and over 50 New York City artists to launch The Trickle Up, a video streaming service—available at $10 a month—from which donations will be used to help artists living below the poverty line during the coronavirus pandemic. The platform aims to get 10,000 subscribers and to then distribute $10,000 to 10 different artists affected by COVID-19 cancellations every month. Sign up to receive content from The Trickle Up here.
LA MAMA
Season: All public events and live shows are suspended until further notice.
Alternative programming: La MaMa has teamed up with CultureHub to continue to offer creative support for the theatre community with Online Happenings, featuring live streaming of performances on Howlround Theatre Commons, talks, workshops for kids, and more. Find out more here.
LINCOLN CENTER THEATER & LCT3
Season: Lincoln Center Theater’s spring programming has been postponed and will re-open in the fall. This includes Intimate Apparel, the new opera adaptation of Lynn Nottage’s play, which will return to the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater where the run was previously cut short during previews.
Alternative programming: Lincoln Center at Home, the organization’s free, temporary portal, features a family-focused Pop-Up Classroom, #ConcertsForKids, and an array of archival and live stream performances, some of which have not been seen since their original airings. Visit LincolnCenter.org for a weekly schedule.
MANHATTAN THEATRE CLUB
Season: The remainder of the 2019–2020 season has been canceled, with plans to reschedule Qui Nguyen’s Poor Yella Rednecks and Emily Feldman’s The Best We Could (a family tragedy) in a future season.
Alternative programming: The newly launched MTC Digital features live Q&As (earlier this week Poor Yella Rednecks playwright Qui Nguyen and director May Adrales went on Instagram Live for a discussion), home concerts like this Benjamin Scheuer performance, and weekly educational offerings like Family Drama Playwriting Workshop series.
MCC THEATER
Season: The remainder of the 2019–2020 season has been canceled, which includes two world premieres: Jocelyn Bioh’s comedy Nollywood Dreams and Lucy Thurber’s Perry Street.
Alternative programming: Online offerings include an upcoming open mic night (April 23) and a “Creative in Quarantine” work session with MCC’s community via Zoom. Register for events here.
NEW GROUP
Season: The company’s next scheduled production, Black No More, is set to go ahead in October. The New Group was forced to cancel remaining performances of its spring show, Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice, in March.
NEW YORK THEATRE ROW
Season: Live programming is suspended until further notice. This impacts upcoming shows Romeo & Bernadette, My Mother’s Severed Head, and Brecht on Brecht.
NEW YORK THEATRE WORKSHOP
Season: All live programming has been suspended until further notice.
Alternative programming: Every Monday at 3 PM, members of NYTW’s artistic community lead master classes on directing, writing, performance and beyond. You can watch the dramaturgy class with Slave Play playwright Jeremy O. Harris here; and sign up for future master classes with Lileana Blain-Cruz and Celia Keenan-Bolger here. Additional virtual programming includes NYTW’s Fireside Chats, with playwrights Celine Song and Martyna Majok, and artistic director James C. Nicola.
NEW WORLD STAGES
Season: Live programming is suspended through June 7. This includes productions of Jersey Boys, The Play That Goes Wrong, Rock of Ages, Gazillion Bubble Show, Katsura Sunshine’s Rakugo (returns June 20), The Imbible, and Drift.
PLAYWRIGHTS HORIZONS
Season: Live programming is suspended. This includes Sylvia Khoury’s Selling Kabul.
Alternative programming: Keep an eye on Playwrights’ social for alerts on things like live reunion readings of The Heidi Chronicles, as well as the company’s YouTube page for behind-the-scenes videos like this one, from the cut-short production of Unknown Soldier. Other offerings include the early launch of Soundstage, a new scripted fiction podcast penned by playwrights and composers. Episode 1, by Heather Christian, dropped April 9, followed by the Robert O’Hara episode April 16. Learn more here.
PLAYWRIGHTS REALM
Season: Live spring events have been canceled, including Noah Diaz’s Richard & Jane & Dick & Sally, as well as the company’s annual gala.
Alternative programming: Each Tuesday at 3 PM, Realm staff members teach online workshops in subjects ranging from play submissions and self-producing to marketing a show and making sure your budget aligns with your values. Sign up for the Realm’s email list for updates.
PRIMARY STAGES
Season: The final show of the 2019–2020 season, Jiehae Park’s Peerless, has been moved to the 2020–2021 season. The darkly comic re-imagining of Shakespeare’s Macbeth will kick off the new season at 59E59 Theaters in the fall.
Alternative programming: Check out Primary Plus, a series of online programs aimed at helping artists connect with the theatre and with each other through the pandemic. Among the online offerings are free YouTube master classes (Sharon Washington, Adrienne Campbell-Holt, and Thom Sesma are among those who have already taken part), lunch-and-learn group writing workshops for playwrights via Zoom, a virtual film club in which cast members from The Confession of Lily Dare discuss Charles Busch’s top 10 favorite tearjerker films (with links to watch the movies), and play read-alongs, in which you can sign up to read a part in plays like Kate Hamill’s Little Women and David Ives’s All in the Timing. Learn more here.
THE PUBLIC THEATER
Season: All activities and live performances are canceled through May 17, with Joe’s Pub events canceled through May 31. This impacts the scheduled productions of The Vagrant Trilogy, a trio of plays by Mona Mansour, that had been set to run March 17–April 26, and The Visitor, a new Tom Kitt-Brian Yorkey musical that was scheduled to run March 24–May 10.
Alternative programming: Online programming includes Suzan-Lori Parks live streaming her work sessions from home, a Soft Power virtual listening party on YouTube April 17, the ongoing Brave New Shakespeare Challenge, featuring Public alums recording their interpretations of passages from the Bard, and free archival performances from the Joe’s Pub stage. Stay up to date with the online calendar here.
RATTLESTICK PLAYWRIGHTS THEATER
Season: With live programming suspended, the theatre was forced to close Ren Dara Santiago’s The Siblings Play in previews, while offering a limited number of view-at-home-tickets to the production after closing.
Alternative programming: Rattlestick has launched a weekly Virtual Salon Series featuring conversations between theatre artists and leading experts around COVID-19. On April 21 playwright Cori Thomas (Lockdown) and formerly incarcerated teaching artist Robert Pollock will discuss the challenges of incarceration during a pandemic. Upcoming discussion topics include Domestic Violence during the pandemic, Economics, and Ritual of the End of Life. Online reservations are required at Rattlestick.org.
RED BULL THEATER
Season: The season is on hold until further notice.
Alternative programming: Virtual offerings include live, informal conversations with artists (kicking things off was Michael Urie), as well as Red Bull Theater Live, a series of readings that will reunite cast members of earlier Off-Broadway productions. A reunion reading of ‘Tis Pity She’s a Whore will be the first presentation on April 20, live streamed for free via the company’s website and on Facebook.
ROUNDABOUT THEATRE COMPANY
Season: Two spring productions have been moved to the 2021 season: Jiréh Breon Holder’s …what the end will be, which was originally scheduled to begin Off-Broadway in May; and Dave Harris’ Exception to the Rule, previously scheduled to begin April 30.
Alternative programming: Roundabout is currently working to provide subscribers and ticket-holders with the opportunity to digitally experience Hilary Bettis 72 Miles to Go… (a world premiere that was cut short).
SECOND STAGE
Season: The season is postponed. This impacts the spring production of the new musical Between the Lines (set to begin in May) as well as the Broadway revival of Take Me Out (originally scheduled to begin in April).
Alternative programming: Follow 2ST’s Instagram to see Second Stage alums share some of their favorite stories and memories of the theatre.
SIGNATURE THEATRE
Season: The last two productions of the 2019–2020 season have been postponed: Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992 by Anna Deavere Smith, and Confederates by Dominique Morisseau. Both originally scheduled for the spring, the organization is committed to producing both plays in a future season.
Alternative programming: SigSpace, a platform home for live performance and events including concerts, works-in-progress, storytelling, panels, social justice conversations, and self-care activities. Artists who will take part include Bill Irwin, Anna Deavere Smith, Saheem Ali, Kuhoo Verma, and more.
ST ANN’S WAREHOUSE
Season: Spring programming is on hold, which means The Jungle, which was set to return to St. Ann’s Warehouse April 1, has been postponed.
THEATRE FOR A NEW AUDIENCE
Season: Spring programming is on hold, which impacts performances of Will Eno’s Gnit (originally scheduled through March 29), now suspended, and Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot directed by Arin Arbus, originally scheduled April 25–May 24, which has been postponed.
Alternative programming: Follow TFANA’s Twitter for Fefu-inspired quizzes and more.
VINEYARD THEATRE
Season: The upcoming spring production, Antoinette Nwandu’s Tuvalu, or The Saddest Song, has been canceled. The Vineyard is exploring ways to bring the play back in the future, along with Lucas Hnath’s Dana H., which was suspended and then canceled in the wake of the pandemic. The Vinyeard also canceled its gala benefit.
Alternative programming: The Vineyard is currently developing online programming, including live chats with Vineyard artists, peeks in the (virtual) rooms where new work is being developed, and an online reading series. In the meantime, sign up to the Vineyard’s email list for updates and podcast recommendations, and keep an eye on its Instagram stories for bread-baking tips and other fun quarantine activities.
WP THEATRE
Season: Live programming is suspended, which impacts the bi-annual Pipeline Festival, a showcase of new plays written, directed, and produced by WP Lab members.
Alternative programming: WP has moved Pipeline online. Follow @wptheater on instagram and #PipelineOnline to get up close and personal with the five shows that were set to run at the festival. The virtual festival features excerpts from the plays, designs, and more.
