How to Dance in Ohio, the first Broadway musical with openly Autistic actors playing Autistic characters, is currently running at the Belasco Theatre. This is quite ironic for me because recent neurodiverse representation on that particular stage has historically been… not great.
“How To Dance In Ohio,” the new musical that opened Sunday night at the Belasco Theatre, marks a laudable first for Broadway: A show about autistic persons who are actually played by actors with autism. But as groundbreaking “How To Dance” is as an idea, its execution across the board does not match its admirable intentions. The show, directed by Sammi Cannold, waffles between being stalely predictable and taking confounding narrative leaps. The construction of plot and dialogue is shoddy.
“How to Dance in Ohio,” a joyous, witty, and sharp musical based on the HBO documentary of the same name, brings to colorful life the experiences of a group of autistic teenagers.