Among the new releases for NYC theater lovers are the memoir of a Tony-winning director, the book of a wildly original musical by a Pulitzer Prize finalist, the free online presentation of a filmed stage performance by an acclaimed company specializing in forgotten plays from the past, and the upcoming audio version of a current Off-Broadway comedy.
Opening Doors: Reimagining the American Musical – In his detailed and engagingly personal first book, director John Doyle reflects on the journey of his life and his 50-year career in the theater through twelve significant chapters, from his origins in the Scottish Highlands of Inverness to his acclaimed work in regional theater, opera, and some of the biggest hits on Broadway (including Sweeney Todd, Company, and The Color Purple), earning him multiple Tony Awards and lifelong friendships with their stars and creators (among them, Stephen Sondheim, John Kander, Chita Rivera, and Patti LuPone, who wrote the foreword to this entertaining and enlightening memoir). Through it all, Doyle offers practical advice and insights into the industry, discussing his positions as Artistic Director for a number of international theaters (including his tenure at NYC’s Classic Stage Company) and educator (most notably at Princeton University), his innovative development of the “actor-musician” musical, the importance of “essentialism” to tell the truth of the stories, their characters, and the socio-political messages they deliver, and the need to “keep on knocking” and “opening doors” to represent yourself and others well. The volume also contains eight pages of photos of him and his highlights through the years and an appendix of the wealth of shows he directed.
John Doyle, Opening Doors: Reimagining the American Musical (London: Bloomsbury Publishing, Methuen Drama, January 22, 2026), 248 pages, ISBN: 978-1-350-50852-1, hardcover, $35.00, Ebook, ISBN: 978-1-350-508552, $31.50. To purchase, go online.
The Hang – Published by Theatre Communications Group (TCG), North America’s largest independent trade publisher of dramatic literature, this powerful work from playwright, MacArthur Fellow, Pulitzer Prize finalist, and Tony nominee Taylor Mac and composer/collaborator Matt Ray was commissioned, developed, and produced by NYC’s HERE Arts Center, where it premiered in 2022, won two Obie Awards, and received four Drama Desk Award nominations. The sung-through theatrical fantasia of philosophy, queerness, spirit, and community reimagines the final hours on the eve of the death of Socrates, sentenced to die for corrupting the youth – by having sex with them – in ancient Athens, where he decides to spend his remaining time doing what he loves most: debating the true meaning of virtue, singing, dancing, laughing, and hanging out. The post-modern operatic jazz riff on philosophical history, complete with a chorus of Radical Faeries (a gay movement that began in the US in the 1970s) and a Plato who inaccurately writes it all down, underscores “what’s most important in life, as in theater: the unwritable moments of joyous communion.”
Taylor Mac, The Hang, with music by Matt Ray (New York: Theatre Communications Group, February 10, 2026), 128 pages, ISBN: 978-1-63670-188-2, paperback, $16.95. To order, go to the TCG website.
Crooked Cross – Making its debut in Birmingham in 1935, presented in London in 1937, and not staged again until the Mint Theater Company’s fall 2025 production directed by Jonathan Bank at NYC’s Theatre Row, Sally Carson’s dramatization of her 1934 novel of the same name tells the story of the Klugers, facing the economic decline and political challenges of life in a Bavarian mountainside village in the period between Christmas 1932 and June 1933, when Hitler was rising to power. Lexa Kluger is engaged to Moritz Weissmann, a Jewish doctor; her brothers Helmy and Erich are becoming increasingly involved with the Nazi party due to the declining employment opportunities in Germany and their yearning to belong. As a result, the family is torn apart by their conflicting loyalties and the horrors of brutal anti-Semitism.
As part of the Mint’s free streaming series, the 2025 recording of a live on-stage performance of Crooked Cross will be available on demand from February 9, 6 pm-February 22, 12 am, 2026, on the company’s website. To view the show, click here.
The Disappear – Written and directed by Erica Schmidt, the Off-Broadway world-premiere comedy, with a stellar cast led by Hamish Linklater and Miriam Silverman, follows the troubled 20-year marriage of two creative artists – film director Ben and best-selling novelist Mira – whose contentious passive-aggressive relationship is tested by the passage of time, the stress caused by ego, ambition, and fame, extramarital affairs, and a daughter (or two) that he never really wanted. When they are obliged to work together on a new film starring his latest young paramour and a renowned actor attracted to his talented wife, their life goes completely off-script, tempers flare, and they are forced to examine what they really love and want – or want to let go.
The stage production of The Disappear plays through Sunday, February 22, 2026, at Audible’s Minetta Lane Theatre, 18 Minetta Lane, NYC. For tickets (priced at $60-130, plus fees), go online, or find discount tickets at TodayTix. Following its extended engagement of live performances, the work will be recorded and released as an audio play to reach audiences everywhere. For updates, visit Audible Originals.
