‘THE BALUSTERS’: (clockwise from left) Ricardo Chavira, Carl Clemons-Hopkins, Richard Thomas, Anika Noni Rose, Jeena Yi, Marylouise Burke & Kayli Carter. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

THE BALUSTERS
By David Lindsay-Abaire
Directed by Kenny Leon
Through June 21, 2026
Manhattan Theatre Club at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre
261 West 47th St.
https://www.manhattantheatreclub.com/shows/2025-26-season/the-balusters

By Scott Harrah

Everyone in Vernon Point thinks they are progressive and open-minded. That is the first misconception and the most revealing one in this blisteringly funny look at bigotry, bias, and 21st-century culture wars. The play draws big laughs even as it cuts close to the bone. In The Balusters, playwright David Lindsay-Abaire sets the scene for a neighborhood association meeting where civility feels carefully staged. At first, the group debates mundane topics like safety, zoning, and aesthetics. Soon, the tone shifts.

What begins as a polite discussion about community values quickly turns into a competition over who can sound the most enlightened, while revealing just the opposite. Brooks (Carl Clemons-Hopkins) recounts a visit to a local store and describes a man’s glare as “an I-hate-gay-people look.” The comment sets off a wave of narrow-minded conclusions about religion, identity, and intent. Vernon Point may be fictional, but The Balusters mirrors modern American tensions around prejudice and identity. As a result, the satire lands with uncomfortable precision. Laughter ripples through the audience. Often, a brief hush follows as the implications sink in.

Civic pride and prejudice

The play opens in the stately Victorian home of Kyra (Anika Noni Rose), a newcomer eager to make a good impression. She and her housekeeper Luz (Maria-Christina Oliveras) prepare for the meeting. Luz knows the neighborhood well because she has worked for several families, including association president Elliot (Richard Thomas).

Kyra’s hopes for a pleasant evening dissolve quickly. First to arrive is Melissa (Jeena Yi), the sharp-tongued vice president, whose awkward misstep with Luz sets the tone. Penny (Marylouise Burke), a well-meaning but often oblivious longtime secretary, follows. Then comes Ruth (Margaret Colin), the blunt and dry-witted treasurer who says what others avoid.

Soon, the room fills with clashing personalities. Isaac (Ricardo Chavira) bristles at political correctness. Alan (Michael Esper) tries to be the “nice guy” but retreats when challenged. Willow (Kayli Carter) polices language with earnest intensity. Brooks observes it all with dry, knowing detachment. Elliot, the self-appointed guardian of the neighborhood’s traditions, arrives ready to preside. As Brooks puts it, “It’s not too late, Kyra. You can still escape.”

Biases simmer beneath the surface

At first, the meeting sticks to routine business. Then an innocuous conversation about safety and whether or not to put up a stoplight exposes deeper biases. What begins as practical concern quickly turns personal. A passing remark about suspicious activity spirals into a debate over racial profiling. Meanwhile, attempts at inclusive language spark their own tensions. The terminology some use starts petty squabbles. For example, one character pushes back against being labeled “Latinx,” calling it “retro woke bulls**t.” Another character objects to the term “lame” as being “ableist.”

The script spares no group. It shows how quickly good intentions give way to defensiveness.

Gavel down, gloves off

Under Kenny Leon’s direction, tensions build steadily before everything unravels into something far messier. Mr. Lindsay-Abaire’s rapid-fire, overlapping dialogue creates strong momentum. Punchlines land in quick succession and often overlap, as if the characters are racing to outdo one another. The staging turns Kyra’s stately home into a pressure cooker. As a result, polite conversation gives way to barely concealed hostility. Each character struggles to maintain composure.

The ensemble is uniformly strong. Anika Noni Rose anchors the production with quiet authority and holds her ground as the room spirals around her. Richard Thomas balances Elliot’s easy charm with an undercurrent of control. Carl Clemons-Hopkins delivers the evening’s driest humor. Marylouise Burke finds both comedy and pathos in Penny’s well-meaning obliviousness. Margaret Colin is especially sharp as Ruth and lands her barbed observations with precision. Together, the cast maintains cohesion even as their characters pull in opposite directions.

Nothing off-limits

By the end, The Balusters shows that nothing is off-limits. Early jabs at anti-fur activism, introduced with Ruth’s arrival, establish the tone for a play that steadily widens its target. Mr. Lindsay-Abaire takes aim at everything from debates over Muslims and gays to casual bigoted perceptions of Jews, Black, and Latino communities. As a result, the play becomes an equal-opportunity lampoon where no one is spared. The humor is relentless and at times uncomfortable. It underscores how true to life the story feels.

Few recent Broadway comedies land laughs this consistently or this uncomfortably.

The Balusters plays like a sharply observed slice of American life. The effort to be thoughtful, inclusive, and aware often veers into something far messier. Mr. Lindsay-Abaire captures both good intentions and high-wire tension in a culture that talks over itself. Every word is scrutinized and every misstep is amplified. In Vernon Point, everyone wants to get it right. That may be the problem. David Lindsay-Abaire’s The Balusters may be the funniest and most incisive look yet at political correctness in American life.

Published April 21, 2026
Reviewed at press preview on April 19, 2026.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: (seated) Jeena Yi, Marylouise Burke & (standing) Michael Esper & Richard Thomas. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: Anika Noni Rose & Carl Clemons-Hopkins. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: Carl Clemons-Hopkins, Margaret Colin, Michael Esper & Jeena Yi. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: Kayli Carter, Carl Clemons-Hopkins, Anika Noni Rose & Jeena Yi. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: Anika Noni Rose & Marylouise Burke. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’ (collage, left to right): Margaret Colin & Maria-Christina Oliveras. Photos: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: Ricardo Chivira & Margaret Colin. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

‘THE BALUSTERS’: Richard Thomas & Anika Noni Rose. Photo: Jeremy Daniel.

The post ‘The Balusters’: ‘Woke’ wars on the block appeared first on StageZine.

‘UNCLE VANYA’: Steve Carell. Photo: Marc J. Franklin.

UNCLE VANYA
By Anton Chekhov
A new version by Heidi Schreck
Directed by Lila Neugebaeur
Lincoln Center Theater at the Vivian Beaumont
150 West 65^th Street
https://www.lct.org/about/beaumont-theater/

By Scott Harrah

The Russian dramas of Anton Chekhov are never easy plays for American audiences to endure for numerous reasons. Unlike the classics of William Shakespeare, they were never originally written in English so anything poetic and florid about the language is often lost in the proverbial translation. Anton Chekov himself supposedly said Uncle Vanya was intended to be a comedy. If he indeed wanted the play to be interpreted for laughs, Mr. Chekhov would probably love the fact that this latest version—with an updated book by What the Constitution Means to Me playwright Heidi Schreck—at Lincoln Center stars none other than The 40-Year-Old Virgin himself, Steve Carell of “The Office” fame. Mr. Carell is about as American as one gets, and he’s one of our best comic actors. He gets laughs from the audience whenever he’s on the stage.

One might need to down a few vodkas to actually see this drama, first produced in Moscow in 1899, as a comedy, but Vanya (originally subtitled Scenes from a Country Life) and the plays of Chekhov in general are so lugubrious, talky and long that they have always been ripe for parody. Remember the hilarious Chekhov spoof from the 2012 Broadway season by the late Christopher Durang, Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike? However, this 21st century interpretation of Uncle Vanya is hardly a parody. It is more like a lighthearted Cliff Notes version of a Chekhov classic with contemporary comic touches.

It is hard to feel much sympathy for the Russian aristocracy portrayed in Uncle Vanya because they are so affluent, immoral and self-indulgent, bored with their summer days in their country home. The play is really about upper-class people who are afraid of wasting their lives, but do not bother to do anything meaningful or pragmatic to better themselves.

The story focuses on a couple from the city, Alexander (Alfred Molina), a professor in poor health, and his gorgeous young wife, Elena (Anika Noni Rose). They have traveled to the rural Russian village to check on their country estate and let everyone living there know they intend to sell the property. Vanya lives on the estate with his niece Sonia (Alison Pill) and he isn’t happy about the visit from Alexander, who is Vanya’s brother-in-law and Sonia’s father. Vanya manages his late sister’s estate with Sonia’s help.  Vanya isn’t amused at all about all the hoopla everyone makes over the professor and his trophy wife. Vanya and the hard-drinking doctor Astrov (William Jackson Harper) are both hot for Elena. Sonia has a crush on the doctor.

Uncle Vanya is a drama originally written in four acts, with a plot that features everything from a love triangle to an attempted murder. Heidi Schreck does a fine job of trimming some of the narrative blather and updating the text for modern audiences, highlighting much of the humor Anton Chekhov supposedly inserted into the story. Mimi Lien’s stage design is a bit of a head-scratcher. The Vivian Beaumont has a vast stage and, as StageZine’s late co-publisher and managing editor David NouNou often said, it is difficult to produce any play in this theater without a lavish set because otherwise, the actors seem like they are being swallowed whole by a stage decorated with sparse scenery. Ms. Lien’s set sometimes resembles a dark city park or a campground.

Director Lila Neugebauer does her best to get fine performances from the stellar cast. Mr. Carrell is his usual charming self, and he definitely has the acting chops for drama (as anyone who saw him play a Marcel Proust-loving, neurotic gay man in Little Miss Sunshine back in 2006 can attest). The fact that Steve Carell is doing Chekhov is funny all by itself, but he approaches the role here with everything he has, and audiences will love him. He is droll and angst-ridden and gives one of the most original interpretations of the title character to date.

It is always a pleasure to see Alfred Molina on the Broadway stage, and this is a far different role than some of his previous shows, such as his Tevye in the 2004 revival of Fiddler on the Roof and his Tony-nominated roles as artist Mark Rothko in Red and Yvan in Yazmina Reza’s Art. Mr. Molina is more than convincing as ailing professor Alexander.

Another noteworthy performance is given by Broadway veteran and Tony-winning actress Jayne Houdyshell as Maria, Vanya’s mother. Ms. Houdyshell is consistently outstanding, and it’s too bad she didn’t have a larger role here.

The gorgeous Anika Noni Rose as Elena is another actress who is no stranger to Broadway. Ms. Rose starred in Tony Kushner’s Caroline, or Change and as Maggie the Cat in a revival of an all-Black production of Cat On a Hot Tin Roof opposite Terrence Howard, as well as A Raisin in the Sun. She has both the beauty and the onstage sexual chemistry to get all the guys pining for her. Ms. Rose skillfully plays up every aspect of Elena being a bored wife to her much-older husband.

William Jackson Harper, best known for his role on the NBC TV sitcom “The Good Place,” is delightful as the boozy doctor Astrov. Alison Pill’s Sonia has the right mix of vulnerability and naiveté.

Did Chekhov really think Uncle Vanya was a comedy? The same has been said about Chekhov’s most famous drama The Cherry Orchard, and this critic reviewed two mind-numbingly inept productions of that classic both on and off Broadway over the past 20 years. Let’s leave the question of “Russian drama as comedy” up to the academics. This new, abridged version of Uncle Vanya, with many modern comic touches by playwright Heidi Schreck and director Lila Neugebauer, won’t win over Chekhov purists, but it is accessible enough for present-day audiences to enjoy.

Edited by Scott Harrah
Published May 15, 2024
Reviewed at May 12, 2024 performance

‘UNCLE VANYA’: Alfred Molina & Anika Noni Rose. Photo: Marc J. Franklin.

‘UNCLE VANYA:’ William Jackson Harper & Anika Noni Rose. Photo: Marc J. Franklin.

‘UNCLE VANYA:’ William Jackson Harper & Alison Pill. Photo: Marc J. Franklin.

‘UNCLE VANYA’: The cast. Photo: Marc J. Franklin.

The post ‘Uncle Vanya’: Chekhov with a modern touch appeared first on StageZine.