15 Shows to See Off Broadway in September

Catch Rachel Bloom, Patrick Page, a new Sondheim musical and more

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The Creeps – September 1

Playhouse 46 at St. Luke’s, 308 West 46th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in Midtown West

Previews begin September 1. Opens September 7. Closes November 5. If you’re a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase discount tickets.

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Primary Stages: Dig – September 2

59E59 Theaters, 59 East 59th Street between Madison and Park Avenues in Midtown East

Previews begin September 2. Opens September 20. Closes November 5.

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Dracula, A Comedy of Terrors – September 4

New World Stages, 340 West 50th Street between Eighth and Ninth Avenues in Midtown West

Previews begin September 4. Opens September 18. Closes January 7, 2024.

Finally, a comedy with bite! Gordon Greenberg and Steve Rosen’s pop culture- and pun-filled spin on Bram Stoker’s classic tale trades horror for humor as five actors sink their teeth into dozens of roles, with James Daly playing a pansexual, playboy Dracula grappling with an existential crisis. Greenberg also directs this gender-bending, quick-changing romp, which costars cutups Andrew Keenan-Bolger (Newsies) and Arnie Burton (The Government Inspector).

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Irish Repertory Theatre: Love Letters – September 5

Irish Repertory Theatre, 132 West 22nd Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues in Chelsea

Begins September 5. Closes October 4.

Irish Rep presents three different starry couplings in Love Letters, A.R Gurney’s popular epistolary two-hander about a pair of friends writing to each other over a lifetime. Matthew Broderick and Talia Balsam are the pen pals September 5 to 8; J. Smith-Cameron and Victor Garber continue the correspondence September 19 to 24; and Brooke Shields and John Slattery sign off September 27 to October 4. Admittedly, there isn’t a lot to see in Love Letters, which is typically staged with the characters sitting at separate tables and speaking directly to the audience. But there is a lot to feel—it’s an emotional, amusing and relatable journey.

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Death, Let Me Do My Show – September 6

Lucille Lortel Theatre, 121 Christopher Street between Bleecker and Hudson Streets in the West Village

Previews begin September 6. Opens September 14. Closes September 30.

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Soho Playhouse: JOB – September 6

Soho Playhouse, 15 Vandam Street between Sixth Avenue and Varick Street in Soho

Previews begin September 6. Opens September 18. Closes October 29. 

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Audible Theater: Swing State – September 8

Minetta Lane Theatre, 18 Minetta Lane between Sixth Avenue and MacDougal Street in the West Village

Previews begin September 8. Opens September 17. Closes October 28. If you’re a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase discount tickets.

After earning rave reviews in Chicago last fall, the Goodman Theatre’s mounting of Swing State transfers to New York City. Don’t let the title trigger you. Set in rural Wisconsin, this gorgeously observed character study, written by Pulitzer finalist Rebecca Gilman (The Glory of Living, Boy Gets Girl), is not, in fact, about politics. It’s about the experiences that divide and undo us: loss, grief, despair. Centering on the relationship between a sexagenarian widow and her neighbor, a fragile, twentysomething ex-con who’s like a surrogate son, it’s a quietly devastating drama about the challenges everyday life and the power of empathy. Tony winner Robert Falls (Death of a Salesman) directs.

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Playwrights Realm: Mary Gets Hers – September 11

The Robert W. Wilson MCC Theater Space, 511 West 52nd Street between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in Midtown West

Previews begin September 11. Opens September 22. Closes October 14.

The Playwrights Realm, a company devoted to emerging dramatists, presents Mary Gets Hers, its first production since the pandemic. An inventive riff on Hrosvitha of Gandersheim’s 10th-century play Abraham, or the Rise and Repentance of Mary, which has been hotly debated by feminists for centuries, Emma Horwitz’s comedy takes place in a plague-riddled Germany, where two hermits discover an abandoned child. They decide to try to protect the girl’s purity at all costs, but Mary has her own ideas about how she wants to live. Parents: the Saturday, September 30 performance at 4 p.m. offers free on-site childcare.

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Roundabout Theatre Company: The Refuge Plays – September 14

Laura Pels Theatre, 111 West 46th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues in Midtown West

Previews begin September 14. Opens October 11. Closes November 12. If you’re a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase discount tickets.

Nathan Alan Davis (Nat Turner in Jerusalem) reimagines the traditional American family play through a Black lens with The Refuge Plays, an epic following three generations of one clan over 70 years. Roundabout Theatre Company coproduces this world premiere with New York Theatre Workshop, where Davis was a NYTW 2050 Artistic Fellow and Usual Suspect. Patricia McGregor directs an ensemble that includes Tina Tony nominee Daniel J. Watts, Soul Food star Nicole Ari Parker and the incomparable Lizan Mitchell.

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Theatre for a New Audience: Prometheus Firebringer – September 15

Polonsky Shakespeare Center, 262 Ashland Place between Lafayette Avenue and Fulton Street in Fort Greene, Brooklyn

Previews begin September 15. Opens TBD. Closes October 1. If you’re a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase discount tickets.

Can AI help us reclaim lost art? That’s what Annie Dorsen explores in her lecture-performance Prometheus Firebringer at Theatre for a New Audience. Only one complete story still exists of Aeschylus’s 2,500-year-old Prometheia trilogy. In Prometheus Firebringer, Dorsen uses the predictive text model GPT-3.5 to write hypothetical versions of one of the missing myths, about Prometheus stealing the gods’ fire to give to humans. Each evening, a chorus of AI-generated Greek masks performs a unique iteration while Dorsen reflects on power, knowledge and how technology impacts our lives and our art.

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WP Theater: Bite Me – September 23

Previews begin September 23. Opens October 5. Closes October 22. If you’re a TDF member, log in to your account to purchase discount tickets.

WP Theater and Colt Coeur present the world premiere of Bite Me, a dark comedy by Eliana Pipes about two very different high school misfits who unexpectedly bond. Nathan, a white boy with money and bad habits, is cutting class when he finds Melody, a Black girl and academic superstar, crying in a storage closet. They get real close real fast, but how long can their passion last? This two-hander explores the challenges of trying to fit in and make connections, both as adolescents and adults. Rebecca Martínez directs.

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Ars Nova: (pray) – September 23

Greenwich House Theater, 27 Barrow Street near Seventh Avenue South in the West Village

Previews begin September 23. Opens October 3. Closes October 28.

Multidisciplinary artist nicHi douglas (SKiNFoLK: An American Show) is behind (pray), an immersive meditation on Black spirituality. Co-produced by the National Black Theatre and Ars Nova, this music-and-dance-filled evening offers an Afrofuturist take on a Sunday Baptist Church service that investigates the complex relationship Black women have with organized religion versus personal faith. Come ready to sing, clap, stomp and learn. Take note: Tickets are pay-what-you-wish starting at $5!

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The Shed: Here We Are – September 28

The Shed, 545 West 30th Street between Tenth and Eleventh Avenues in Hudson Yards

Previews begin September 28. Opens October 22. Closes January 21, 2024.

The world premiere of Stephen Sondheim’s final musical is one of the most anticipated productions of the season. Yes, the buzz is mixed—the New York Post gripes that Act II allegedly has no songs while Frank Rich offers a more nuanced assessment for New York Magazine of how the show was finished after the great man died. Certainly Sondheim lovers are paying high prices to see his last work, which is inspired by two Luis Buñuel films: The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie and The Exterminating Angel. David Ives (Venus in Fur) wrote the book and Joe Mantello directs a starry ensemble, including Tony winners David Hyde Pierce, Rachel Bay Jones and Denis O’Hare alongside Micaela Diamond, Amber Gray, Steven Pasquale and Bobby Cannavale.

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All the Devils Are Here: How Shakespeare Invented the Villain – September 29

DR2 Theatre, 103 East 15th Street between Union Square East and Irving Place near Union Square Park

Previews begin September 29. Opens October 16. Closes March 31, 2024.

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The Mint Theater: Partnership – October 1

Theatre Row, 410 West 42nd Street between Ninth and Dyer Avenues in Midtown West

Previews begin October 1 (delayed from September 30). Opens October 19. Closes November 12.

The Mint Theater Company, which revitalizes forgotten plays, wraps up its Elizabeth Baker series with Partnership, about an independent working woman with zero interest in marriage until her primary competitor makes a professional and personal proposal. Work-life balance and unexpected romance are explored in this 1917 work, which was way ahead of its time.

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