Heathers The Musical: Casey Likes – Photo: Evan Zimmerman
Education is murder for the kids at Westerberg High. Why shouldn’t it be when the three most poisonous and popular girls there are head cheerleader Heather McNamara (Elizabeth Teeter), yearbook organizer Heather Duke (Olivia Hardy), and their persuasive leader, Heather Chandler (McKenzie Kurtz), a “mythic bitch” who everyone loves to hate but hates to love.
“They float above it all… [and] are solid Teflon — never bothered, never harassed. I would give anything to be like that,” Veronica Sawyer (Lorna Courtney) says at the start of the show. For her, “anything” includes criminal acts. With the help of a new kid in town, Jason “J.D.” Dean (Casey Likes), the two become a high school Bonnie and Clyde, eradicating fellow students, including Chandler, who cause them problems.
Heathers: The Musical is one of countless shows to have been based on a movie from the last half-century. In this case, it’s the 1988 film of the same name that starred Winona Ryder as Sawyer and Christian Slater as Dean. The film found a cult following and became so beloved that Laurence O’Keefe and Kevin Murphy decided to give it a stage treatment. Together, the pair wrote the music, lyrics, and book.
Several productions of the musical have been mounted, including an acclaimed 2014 Off-Broadway run, a 2018 version on London’s West End, a 2024 London revival, and several tours throughout the UK and Europe. Now a slightly reworked version has returned to New York’s Off-Broadway scene with plenty of glamour, gloss, and bloodshed.
Andy Fickman directs a richly talented ensemble, all of whom are well above the age of high schoolers but look and carry themselves convincingly enough as teenagers. Courtney, who brought the house down as Broadway’s original Juliet in & Juliet, does it once again, particularly in an 11 o’clock number of self-assured defiance (“I Say No”). Likes, who appears to have a knack for being cast in film-to-stage musicals (Back to the Future, Almost Famous), is vocally solid and brings a nonchalant coolness to Dean.
Teeter, Hardy, and Kurtz are wonderfully conniving and evil, extracting every ounce of meanness possible. Erin L. Morton, making her Off-Broadway debut, is heartbreaking as Martha Dunnstock, an object of scorn for nearly everyone at Westerberg High. Her beautifully mournful solo number, “Kindergarten Boyfriend,” will touch the heart of anyone whose elementary school friend turned against them in high school.
Xavier McKinnon and Cade Ostermeyer bring equal parts goofiness, irritation, and sex appeal to the roles of Ram Sweeney and Kurt Kelly, respectively, two muscled jocks who show off their gym-conditioned bodies and unwittingly become subjects of a gay rumor.
David Shields and Siena Zoë Allen capture a realistic variety of eighties styles with their costumes, especially the preppy tailored suits and plaid skirts worn by the Heathers. Ben Cracknell’s lighting design complements the primary-colored outfits.
While every component of the production works, it’s an ethically difficult show to embrace. Sure, the fat jokes, the homophobic comments, the flippant disregard for mental illness and eating disorders, and slut-shaming are all strong reasons to bristle, but they all align with an era where students could brazenly ridicule and humiliate other students with little to no punishment. Today, most bullying is channeled through social media, and the only person who can get away with such hateful language is the nation’s president.
The more disturbing aspect of Heathers: The Musical, however, is the message that it conveys to a large portion of its teen audience, who may not fully grasp the intended dark humor. In fact, many young women in the audience at a recent performance were dressed as the Heathers. It prominently features gun violence and suicide, two epidemics that continue to strike fear and panic around the globe.
On a primal level, there is deep satisfaction in watching truly awful people get their just desserts. But in retrospect, weren’t we all trying to figure out ourselves and each other? If we’ve matured, our younger days likely include some regret about how we were treated or how we treated others. Here, there isn’t enough of an evolution for any of the characters, and consequently, it feels socially irresponsible. “The extreme always seems to make an impression,” Dean tells Sawyer when they first meet. Even couched in dark humor, it’s not always the right impression to make.
Heathers: The Musical (★★★☆☆) is playing at New World Stages, 340 West 50th Street in New York City through January 25, 2026. Tickets are $133 to $195. Visit www.heathersthemusical.com.
In the time-honored tradition of sci-fi fantasy about kids being whisked away to fantastical realms, Madeleine L'Engle's A Wrinkle in Time starts with the kid in question feeling pretty miserable here on Earth. Thrilling adventure awaits, and happier days may lie ahead for the book's young heroine, Meg Murry, but she'll have to traverse much darkness to reach the light.
That somber phase of Meg's journey is aptly reflected in Arena Stage's world-premiere adaptation, featuring music and lyrics by Heather Christian and a book by Lauren Yee. Lee Sunday Evans, who recently staged Christian's Oratorio for Living Things Off-Broadway to much acclaim, directs this atmospheric production starring Taylor Iman Jones (Broadway's SIX) as Meg, a bright but indeed downhearted middle schooler.
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