Musical

Chess

0 upcoming performances in New York

Set against the late–Cold War, *Chess* follows a world chess championship where strategy on the board becomes proxy warfare off it, pitting an American star against a Soviet rival as a manager is pulled between professional duty and personal attachment. The score comes from Benny Andersson and Björn Ulvaeus, with lyrics by Tim Rice, and it treats politics as atmosphere rather than backdrop. In New York, the show’s Broadway run in 1988 helped cement it as a cult title here, often revisited for its sharper-than-usual view of ideology as performance. It is at the Imperial Theatre and the Todd Haimes Theatre, with a Broadway performance scheduled for May 3, 2026.