George Clooney’s screen-to-stage adaptation of “Good Night, and Good Luck,” which cost up to $9.5 million to capitalize, broke Broadway records, grossing $3.3 million in one week – the most money a nonmusical has ever made on Broadway, as audiences seem undeterred by the $799-top ticket price.

Scripted by Clooney & Grant Heslov and directed by David Cromer (“The Band’s Visit’), this timely, powerful drama centers on crusading, chain-smoking newsman Edward R. Murrow (Clooney) who risked his professional reputation and career to attack Wisconsin’s Junior Senator Joseph McCarthy at the height of his 1950s Communist witch hunt.

“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty…We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason.”

Murrow was supported by stolid producer Fred Friendly (Glenn Fleshler) and wary CBS-CEO William Paley (Paul Gross), along with Murray’s ill-fated protégé Don Hollenbeck (Clark Gregg). All four deliver strong performances.

Less effective is an unnecessary subplot involving secretly married producers Shirley & Joe Wershba (Ilana Glazer, Carter Hudson), while musical interludes from a strategically located jazz band serve as an unnecessary, often annoying distraction, diluting the play’s effective momentum.

News projections by David Bengali bring the historical concept up-to-date by including glimpses of a plane hitting the World Trade Center on 9/11, the attack on the Capitol, and Elon Musk’s Nazi-like salute.

With steely gravitas, 63 year-old Clooney tops it off, proclaiming from behind a podium that “There is a battle to be fought against ignorance, intolerance and indifference for the very soul of this republic….What are you prepared to do?” (Cue applause)…

That’s taken directly from Murrow’s speech at the 1958 Radio and Television News Directors Association Annual Meeting in which he chided media for abandoning its mission to inform and illuminate the public.

Kudos to atmospheric set designer Scott Peck, costumer Brenda Abbandandolo and Heather Gilbert’s hanging halogen lamps, for their authentic recreation of the vintage CBS broadcast center/offices at Grand Central Terminal.

FYI: You can rent “Good Night and Good Luck” (2005) – with Clooney as Fred Friendly and Oscar-nominated David Strathairn as Murrow – for $3.99 on Amazon Prime Video. Or try for discounted tickets from TKTS, New York Show Tickets, TodayTix, TheaterMania, BroadwayBox & Playbill.

“Good Night and Good Luck” plays at the Winter Garden through June 8.

First there was “Yellowstone,” Taylor Sheridan’s Montana-set dynastic drama, starring Kevin Costner as the Dutton patriarch. Then came “1883,” a wagon-train prequel, featuring country singers Faith Hill and Tim McGraw as ill-fated early settlers, James & Margaret Dutton, whose daughter Elsa (Isabel May) serves as narrator from beyond the grave. 

That was followed by “1923,” introducing Harrison Ford and Helen Mirren as Jacob & Cara Dutton, Elsa’s childless great-aunt-and-uncle, who raised Elsa’s surviving brothers: John Dutton Jr. (James Badge Dale) who dies early in “1923,” and Spencer Dutton (Brandon Skelnar).

When we meet Spencer Dutton, he’s a WW I war hero battling PTSD by lion-hunting in Africa. That’s where he meets an adventurous Brit, Alexandra Sussex (Julia Schlaepfer), who breaks her aristocratic engagement to run off with him.

Meanwhile, the survival of the Dutton ranch is threatened by sadistic business tycoon Donald Whitfield (Timothy Dalton), prompting Cara to write to Spencer, explaining the dire situation, and begging him to return home.

En route to America, however, elephant-gun-toting Spencer and now-pregnant Alex are forcibly separated, yet both are determined to arrive in Bozeman in time to save the Dutton ranch.

In a parallel story, abused Crow teenager Teonna Rainwater (Aminah Nieves) is eluding bounty-hunters led by a priest who is determined to wreak revenge because she refused to culturally assimilate; obviously “Yellowstone” Chief Rainwater (Gil Birmingham) is one of her descendants.

Writer/director Taylor Sheridan split “1923” into two seasons, the second having just concluded – and Western sagas don’t get more intriguing than this.

Cliffhanger: Who are the parents of John Dutton II (Dabney Coleman), the father of Kevin Costner’s John Dutton III? On the basis of the final “1923” episode, it could be Spencer & Alexandra, yet Spencer’s nephew Jack’s beleaguered fiancée Elizabeth (Michelle Randolph) was pregnant when she left the ranch to return East. Perhaps we’ll find out in “1944,” the next prequel in the “Yellowstone” franchise.

On the Granger Gauge of 1 to 10, “1923: Season 2” scores an exciting 8 – mixing hardship and pain with adventure and romance. All episodes are now available on Paramount+.

Catch up with Susan Granger’s latest reviews here:

• April 10: “White Lotus Season 3”
• April 8: “Theatre People”
• April 3: “The Picture of Dorian Gray” and “Apple Cider Vinegar”
• March 27: “The Residence” and “The Room Next Door”

Westport resident Susan Granger grew up in Hollywood, studied journalism with Pierre Salinger at Mills College and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with highest honors in Journalism. In addition to writing for newspapers and magazines, she has appeared on radio and television as an anchorwoman and movie critic for many years. Read all her reviews at susangranger.com.