Weekend Agenda: Trim My Tree Edition

Well. It’s nearly Christmas, boys and girls. We’re decking the halls, putting glitter on everything and tracking Santa’s whereabouts like it’s our job. Also, we’re following theater a bit, too. Below, some news items that grabbed our attention this week:

• This week, the tiny, wonderful Lysistrata Jones got a rave review in the New York Times. This is cool partly because it deserved it, and partly because it could really use some help with its shockingly low average ticket price, which, last time we checked, was less than the cost of a bucket of fried chicken and a rental DVD.
• I know you say to yourself at least twice a day, “Abraham Lincoln just isn’t that sexy.” Well, you’re wrong.
• The Kim Cattrall-fronted revival of Private Lives will close five weeks early. This is the part where I should probably refrain from saying something about how shows with weird domestic violence-y overtones that play as comedy should probably not be at the top of everyone’s, “Let’s Immediately Revive That!” list. But I won’t.
• Remember that time when some people on Twitter got super indignant because Ben Brantley liked Lysistrata Jones and hated Bonnie & Clyde and somehow thought those things were linked, conspiratorial, and designed simply to torture them? Oh, and also to prove that Ben is just MEAN and UNFAIR and has NO TASTE? We do. And we promise you, Ben Brantley doesn’t.
• Speaking of Bonnie & Clyde. The producers stopped pussyfooting around/torturing their cast/being bad at PR and finally announced the show will close on December 31. This is all terribly shocking, I know. Because they definitely didn’t stop selling (and start refunding) tickets weeks ago or anything like that. The good news is, when it closes, Bonnie & Clyde will have played 69 performances. If you gotta go out, you might as well go out with a lucky number.
• Sergio Trujillo will bring Flashdance to Broadway next year. You know, guys. There are like… things that we would love to transfer over from the West End. And then there are some other things…
• Raul Esparza is officially set to star in Leap of Faith on Broadway, which is now aiming for a fall 2012 opening. If we could hold our breath that long, we would. That’s how excited we are to have our spicy Cuban meatball back on the Broadway singing songs.
• Venus in Fur will transfer to the Lyceum this February, taking its stars Nina Arianda and Hugh Dancy right along with it. If Nina Arianda doesn’t win that Lead Actress Tony this year, we’ll probably just burn the Lyceum to the ground in protest. Everyone thinks that joint is cursed anyway, right?
• We honestly don’t even know why this happened, other than that like… the universe is rightfully seeking just about any excuse to put Ramin Karimloo on television. But this week in London, Pussycat Doll Nicole Scherzinger performed with (count ‘em) FOUR Phantoms of the Opera. And guess what? Homegirl didn’t embarrass herself. I mean, we were watching Ramin the whole time. But… she sounded okay, right?
• New musicals Tuck Everlasting and Duncan Sheik’s Because of Wynn Dixie are eyeing Broadway runs. So. We guess it’s a good time to be a kid who likes theater?
• And last but not least, Steel Burkhardt announced he’d be cutting his long, lustrous locks after he completes his run in Hair on tour this January. We have various concerns about this and its Samson-esque potential to destroy our worlds, and The Mick is probably going to cry herself to sleep tonight in preemptive mourning.