Broadway's 10 best shows of 2024, including 'Oh, Mary!'

NEW YORK — Theater fans have plenty to be grateful for this holiday season.

Over these last 12 months, we’ve been gifted incredible performances from Daniel Dae Kim (“Yellow Face”), Michael Urie (“Once Upon a Mattress”), Jessica Hecht (“Eureka Day”) and Laura Donnelly (“The Hills of California”). Off-Broadway, we were hit with a two-ton joy bomb in the form of “Cats: The Jellicle Ball,” which transported Andrew Lloyd Webber’s divisive musical from the junkyard to the queer ballroom scene. And up on 45^th Street, Danya Taymor minted her status as a visionary director with Tony Award-winning best musical “The Outsiders,” which she elevated well beyond its young-adult origins.

Here's what else we loved on Broadway this past year:

10. 'Cult of Love'

Zachary Quinto and Barbie Ferreira star in a new play about a volatile family reunion where secrets are laid bare. It’s an age-old theater trope, but few recent playwrights have mined the subject with such razor-sharp insight as Leslye Headland (“Russian Doll”), who achingly captures why we keep coming back to the people who hurt us most. Rebecca Henderson and Roberta Colindrez are riveting standouts as the brood’s sensible black sheep, who become targets of Shailene Woodley’s homophobic Jesus freak.

Now playing at the Hayes Theater through Feb. 2.

9. 'The Heart of Rock and Roll'

A year ago, we never could’ve guessed that a Huey Lewis jukebox musical would one day rank among our very best of Broadway. And yet, we firmly believe this short-lived show deserved to be a “Mamma Mia!”-sized hit, with its ingenious staging and clever story set at a three-day packing supplies conference. In a just world, McKenzie Kurtz would’ve coasted to a Tony nod on the sheer power of her “It Hit Me Like a Hammer.”

Closed at the James Earl Jones Theatre on June 23.

8. 'Death Becomes Her'

Most screen-to-stage musicals are stubbornly beholden to their source material. But in adapting “Death Becomes Her,” writer Marco Pennette (“Ugly Betty”) both honors the 1992 film and creates his own weird, raunchy, campy send-up of society’s insatiable beauty obsession. Jennifer Simard and Megan Hilty are deliciously demented as begrudging best friends-turned-youth-starved nemeses, and the show’s body-bending illusions are theatrical magic at its best.

Now playing at the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre.

7. 'An Enemy of the People'

Jeremy Strong earned a best actor Tony for his simmering turn as a 19^th-century physician, whose warnings of impending environmental disaster fall on deaf ears. Although Henrik Ibsen’s drama is more than a century old, its themes of distrust and misinformation are scarily timely, and Sam Gold’s immersive direction brilliantly plunged the audience into the heart of the action.

Closed at the Circle in the Square Theatre on June 23.

6. 'Sunset Boulevard'

As gay men, we have but simple needs, and those include a former Pussycat Doll belting Andrew Lloyd Webber ballads. Not everything works in Jamie Lloyd’s stripped-down, video-heavy revival, but the risks it takes are ultimately far more exciting than most of what’s on Broadway right now. Nicole Scherzinger, too, is undeniable, bringing astounding vocals and haunting desperation to vampiric Hollywood has-been Norma Desmond.

Now playing at the St. James Theatre.

5. 'Mary Jane'

Rachel McAdams made one of the best stage debuts in recent memory in Amy Herzog’s harrowing “Mary Jane,” about a single mom trying to care for her sick child. The Oscar nominee brought disarming wit and naturalism to the resilient character, who grasps for optimism in the most hopeless of circumstances. But Herzog’s perceptive writing skirts easy sentimentality, with a profoundly ambiguous ending that we’re still discussing months later.

Closed at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre on June 30.

4. 'Illinoise'

Broadway is a lot less vibrant without Justin Peck’s miraculous dance musical, which used Sufjan Stevens songs to weave a gorgeous yarn about (quite literally) moving through heartbreak and grief. Ricky Ubeda deserved every award imaginable for his silently shattering work, and we’ll never shut up about watching Rachel Lockhart and Byron Tittle cast a spell with their dizzying footwork in “Jacksonville.”

Closed at the St. James Theatre on Aug. 10.

3. 'Gypsy'

As of press time, there’s not a whole lot we can share about “Gypsy,” which officially opens Dec. 19 at the Majestic Theatre (the former longtime home of “The Phantom of the Opera”). That said, Audra McDonald is a force of nature as the fiercely protective Mama Rose, in a blazing revival that breathes new life into the classic showbiz musical. Hers is perhaps the first “Rose’s Turn” to bring us helplessly to tears.

Now playing at the Majestic Theatre.

2. 'Maybe Happy Ending'

Critics have rightly championed “Maybe Happy Ending” for being the scarcest of Broadway treasures: an entirely original new musical. But more than just inventive, it’s also really damn good. Darren Criss and Helen J Shen are luminous as a pair of star-crossed androids who fall in love on the cusp of their expiration dates. Brimming with humor and heart-tugging emotion, this wise and wistful masterpiece is also one of the most visually stunning shows to hit New York in ages.

Now playing at the Belasco Theatre.

1. 'Oh, Mary!'

With her short legs and long medleys, crazed first lady Mary Todd Lincoln has become an improbable pop-culture sensation, thanks to the deranged genius of playwright/actor Cole Escola. The airtight, 80-minute comedy imagines Lincoln as a petulant shut-in who chugs paint thinner and dreams of stardom when she’s not quarreling with her closet case husband (Conrad Ricamora). Wildly irreverent, oddly touching and unabashedly gay, “Oh, Mary!” is the rare Broadway outing to exceed its deafening hype. Like a big scoop of vanilla ice cream that falls into your lap, it’s sensational.

Now playing at the Lyceum Theatre through June 28.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Best Broadway shows of 2024, including 'Maybe Happy Ending' 'Oh, Mary!'