Illustration: Wes Duvall

8. ‘The Coast of Utopia’
Tom Stoppard’s monumental trilogy premiered in London, but credit Lincoln Center Theater artistic director André Bishop, executive producer Bernard Gersten, and director Jack O’Brien with mounting a new production around the most outstanding company in recent memory. With a cast that includes New York stage stalwarts (Brían F. O’Byrne, Richard Easton) and movie stars who can actually act (Billy Crudup, Ethan Hawke) supported by a dream-team design corps (Scott Pask, Catherine Zuber, Brian MacDevitt), the show ably fulfills part of Lincoln Center’s original mission: to showcase the very best talents of the American stage.