The Best Live Theater to Watch From Home Today – Time Out

The isolation crisis has had a devastating effect on the performing arts. Broadway is closed, and the ban on public gatherings in New York extends to all other performance spaces as well. Under these circumstances, the show must go online: Luckily, streaming video makes it possible to access worlds well beyond our homes. Here are some of the best theater, opera and cabaret performances you can see today without leaving your house or apartmentmany of which will help you support artists in a difficult time. We'll be updating this list every day. Stay in and enjoy the shows. (All show times are given in Eastern Daylight Time.)

SUNDAY, MARCH 29, 2020

2pm: Stars in the House: BeetlejuiceCast with Alex Brightman and Kerry ButlerShowtune savant and SiriusXM host Seth Rudetsky and his husband, producer James Wesley, are the animating forces behind this ambitious new series to benefit the Actors Fund. Twice a day, at 2pm and 8pm, they play host to a different theater star for a live long-form interview interspersed with songs. (Rudetsky is an expert at sussing out good stories.) Dr. Jon LaPook, the chief medical correspondent for CBS News, provides periodic updates on public health; surprise virtual visitors are common as well. Todays matinee features cast members of the Broadway musical Beetlejuicewhich has become a word-of-mouth hit but was scheduled to close in June even before the current crisis, to make way at the Winter Garden Theatre for the Hugh Jackman revival of The Music Manincluding the majorly talented Alex Brightman and Kerry Butler.

3:30pm: Teenage DickChicagos Theater Wit offers a novel rollout for the digital version of its planned run of Mike Lew's dark comedy, which imagines the hunchback king of Shakespeare's Richard III as an American teen with cerebral palsy (played MacGregor Arney) who is dead set on becoming president of his senior class. The company filmed this performance before getting shut down, and although it may take a while for viewers to adjust to the format, the production gathers strength as it moves from broad comedy into teenage tragedy. (We liked the play a lot when it was at the Public in 2018.) The show is being streamed on Vimeo through April 19 according to the planned schedule of the original runThursdays through Saturdays at 9pm, Sunday matinees at 3:30pmwith 98 people permitted to watch per night. A live post-show discussion follows.

6:30pm: Sondheim UnpluggedThe midtown cabaret nightclub Feinsteins/54 Below continues its #54BelowatHome series with a live-streamed archived show viewable for one night only. Tonights selection is an episode of the clubs long-running series Sondheim Unplugged, in whichgifted singers from the Broadway and cabaret worlds sing side by side in a tribute to the newly nonagenarian musical-theater master Stephen Sondheim; The lineup of performersusuallyincludes former cast members of Sondheim shows; this one features Tally Sessions, Marquee Five, Blaine Krauss andSweeney Todd's original Johanna, Sarah Rice.

7pm: Play-PerView: The Pink UnicornThe new virtual-theater initiative Play-PerView presents the always compelling Alice Ripley (Next to Normal) in a live encore of her 2019 performance in Elise Forier Edie's solo show, about a small-town Texas woman whose teenage daughter comes out as genderqueer. Proceeds from all Play-PerView events go to arts organizations affected by the COVID-19 virus; this one benefits the Actors Fund and Out of The Box Theatrics. (Tickets cost $5$50, so act fast if you want to get in on the lower price tiers.)

Alice Ripley in The Pink Unicorn // Photograph: Courtesy Jazelle Artistry

7:30pm: The Metropolitan Opera: Wagner WeekThe Met continues its immensely popular rollout of past performances, recorded in HD and viewable for free. A different archival production goes live at 7:30pm each night and remains viewable for the next 23 hours. This week is devoted to the oeuvre of Richard Wagner; the series concludes tonight with a 2015 recording of Tannhuser, conducted by James Levine and featuring Eva-Maria Westbroek, Michelle DeYoung, Johan Botha, Peter Mattei and Gunther Groissbck.

8pm: Stars in the House: Fun Home Broadway Cast ReunionSee 2pm above. The evening edition of this twice-daily interview show offers a virtual cast reunion of Lisa Kron and Jeanine Tesoris wondrous Tony-winning 2015 Broadway musical Fun Home. Among those scheduled to join the fun from home are Michael Cerveris, Judy Kuhn, Beth Malone, Emily Skeggs and Sydney Lucas, who quietly brought down the house with the instant classic Ring of Keys (which earned a spot on our list of the best Tony Awards performances of all time).

8pm: Out of an Abundance of Caution: Volume TwoThis online minifestival of boundary-pushing works returns for a second edition, co-curated by a trio of Off-Off Broadway theater-makers: the Teams Jessica Almasy, the Bricks Theresa Buchheister and the Bushwick Starrs Lauren Miller. The aim is to provide an inclusive platform for quick and dirty-fascinating work. Peter Funk hosts a roster that includes Braulio Cruz, Shazad, an-outskirt, Hannah Kallenbach and Wendy Carlos Williams, plus half an hour of preshow video by Wazoo. The broadcast is free but tipping via Penpal is encouraged (paypal.me/outofcaution).

8pm: Brian NashA wizard at the piano and an ace musical director, Brian Nash is also an exuberant showman when he takes the mic himselfas he usually does for a seven-hour stretch on Sunday nights at the Duplex in the West Village, where he has held court for the past decade or so. Tonight he brings the magic to Facebook Live. In lieu of a tip jar, you can Venmo him at @BrianJNash. (If you do it in advance, feel free to include a request; $20 makes him holler.)

Brian Nash // Photograph: Courtesy of the artist

BONUS (4pm9:30pm): Maries Crisis Virtual Piano BarThe beloved West Village institution keeps the show tunes rolling merrily along every night of the week. Read all about it here. Join the Maries Group page on Facebook to watch from home, and dont forget to tip the pianist and staff. Tonights scheduled pianists are Adam Michael Tilford (Venmo: @Adam-Tilford-1) and Dan Daly (Venmo: @DanDalyMusic).

BONUS: The Siblings PlayIn Ren Dara Santiago's debut play, set in 2014 Harlem, a teenage girl and her two brothers try to make ends meet and raise each other up in the absence of their too-young parents. Jenna Worsham directs for Off Broadways Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, where Santiago has a residency this year. The production was in previews when theaters got shut downbut this week the Rattlestick has made a recording of the production viewable at home for $15. (The video will stay up through April 5, The Siblings Plays original end date.)

BONUS: The 24 Hour Plays: Viral MonologuesSince 1995, the 24 Hour Plays series has set itself a challenge: to write, cast and perform new playlets in the span of a single night and day. In this variation on that themewhich the group tested for the first time last week24 leading writers create monologues for 24 top actors, who record them and send them in for online broadcast. Yesterday, from 6pm through midnight, a new monologue went live every 15 minutes on the 24 Hours Plays Instagram feed, where you can still watch them today. Among the actors this time are Michael Shannon, Daveed Diggs, William Jackson Harper, Clark Gregg, Dylan Baker, Becky Ann Baker, Marylouise Burke, Ty Defoe, Noah Galvin, Ryan Haddad and Josh Hamilton. The playwrights include Will Arbery, Clare Barron, Eric Bogosian, Bekah Brunstetter, Kristoffer Diaz, Stephen Adly Guirgis, J. Holtham, David Lindsay-Abaire, Jonathan Marc Sherman, Charly Evon Simpson and Tracey Scott Wilson.

BONUS: The Meeting* with Justin SayreWith his wicked witticisms, ardent social activism and cultivated mid-Atlantic accenthe sounds like Lauren Bacall in a saucy moodJustin Sayre is an avatar of retroqueer cultivation. From 2009 to 2015, he shared hilarious rants and raves from the bully (but anti-bullying) pulpit of his monthly show, the Meeting*. Now he revives the format, broadcasting live on YouTube from the basement of singer-producer Julian Fleishers upstate retreat. Country singer-songwriter Terry Radigan is the guest in this episode, recorded on Sunday, March 22. (A suggested donation of $20 can be sent via Venmo to @Justin-Sayre.)

BONUS: Molly Pope: Molly Pope, a Gay Man, and a PianoMolly Pope's viscerally thrilling alto is a rich gusher of sound that emerges like a full-on blast from the past, but her cabaret shows are hilariously full of present tension. In this highly entertaining 70-minute set, recorded in February at the Duplex, the downtown darling and cult gay fave applies her Ed Sullivan Show neoretro vocals to a variety of contemporary pop songs, from the Carpenters and the Bee Gees to the Scissor Sisters and Hole, joined by the frisky Matt Aument at the piano. To view the video on YouTube, send Pope $5 or more through Venmo (@Molly-Pope); include your email address with the purchase, and she'll send you a link to the video.

BONUS: Neil LaButes Ten X TenThe St. Louis Actors Studio presents a series of filmed monologues by the provocative Neil LaBute (In the Company of Men), performed in real time. A different pair will be released each Wednesday for five weeks; links are shared on STLASs Twitter account each Wednesday at 6pm. This weeks monologues are for characters in their twenties, and are performed by Adam Brody and Louisa Krause. (Performers in future weeks include Jenna Fischer, Jason Patric, Richard Kind, Frederick Weller, Maggie Grace, Amy Madigan, Bill Pullman and Judith Light.)

RECOMMENDED: The best musicals you can stream right now on BroadwayHD

NOTE: If you would like to be considered for a listing on this page, please write to Adam Feldman at theaterfromhome@gmail.com.

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The Best Live Theater to Watch From Home Today - Time Out