Few things in life are more stressful than becoming a parent for the first time. In Jonathan Marc Sherman’s new play, “Knickerbocker,” a 40-year-old Jewish man, Jerry (Alexander Chaplin, who played the speechwriter James Hobert on the ABC sitcom “Spin City”) comes to grips with his own fears of impending fatherhood. Directed by Pippin Parker, who chairs the playwriting department at The New School, “Knickerbocker” opens next week at the Public Theater Lab, just a few blocks away from the eponymous restaurant where it is set.

Classical music offers spiritual transcendence for performers and audience members alike. But as the distinguished Israeli pianist and playwright Israela Margalit suggests in her loosely autobiographical new play, “First Prize,” the classical music world is also saturated with much that is sordid and soul-destroying. “First Prize,” which begins previews this weekend at the Arclight Theatre on the Upper West Side, features music from Margalit’s own celebrated recordings with some of the world’s greatest orchestras.