EXCLUSIVE: Newly minted Tony Award winner Jonathan Groff will play the 1950s and ’60s crooner Bobby Darin in a staged reading next month, ahead of a planned Broadway opening in spring 2025, people familiar with the musical said.Continue Reading
JEREMY O. HARRIS LANDS STARRING ROLE AT WILLIAMSTOWN (EXCLUSIVE)
In an out-of-the-box hire to revive one of the nation’s preeminent summer theaters, the playwright, producer and actor Jeremy O. Harris has been tapped to program the Williamstown Theatre Festival, a person familiar with the company said.
The 34-year-old Slave Play playwright will lead a “creative collective” at the 70-year-old Western Massachusetts institution, which in recent years has been a prime tryout venue for Broadway. Acting alumni include Matthew Broderick, Audra McDonald and Bradley Cooper.Continue Reading
‘FORBIDDEN BROADWAY’ IS BROADWAY BOUND
EXCLUSIVE: Four decades after Gerard Alessandrini introduced his Broadway satirical revue at an Upper West Side cabaret, the ever-changing spoof will finally plant its funny flag in a Broadway theater.
Forbidden Broadway, Merrily We Stole a Song is scheduled to run at the Hayes Theater July 29 to Nov. 4, according to a pitch deck prepared for prospective investors. The title is a play on Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Merrily We Roll Along, which evolved from 1981 flop to this season’s boffo revival, which is on the cusp of recouping its $13 million capitalization.Continue Reading
EDDIE REDMAYNE-LED ‘CABARET’ WILL TRANSFER TO BROADWAY IN 2024 (EXCLUSIVE)
Ambassador Theatre Group and Underbelly Productions plan to transfer their hit West End revival of Cabaret to Broadway, two people familiar with the production said.
Eddie Redmayne has committed to reprise his performance as the louche Weimar-era nightclub emcee — a role made famous by Joel Grey in the 1966 Hal Prince-directed musical and in the 1972 Bob Fosse-helmed movie, and more recently by Alan Cumming in two Roundabout Theatre Co. revivals. Rebecca Frecknall is slated to direct the production, which is to begin previews in March 2024 ahead of an April opening.Continue Reading
NEW YORK EXTENDS $3 MILLION BROADWAY TAX CREDIT; DISNEY’S ‘ALADDIN’ APPROVED
New York State extended the New York City Musical and Theatrical Production Tax Credit, a subsidy of up to $3 million per Broadway show, as the industry struggles with rising costs and subpar sales.
On May 3, Gov. Kathy Hochul announced the two-year extension through 2025 and said commercial Off-Broadway shows will also be eligible, albeit for a smaller credit. The Broadway League trade association lobbied for preserving the program. It was designed to jumpstart the industry, which contributes billions to the economy, and encourage productions “to begin performances sooner and come back stronger” as the city recovered from Covid-19.Continue Reading
BEN PLATT TO LEAD $6.5 MILLION ‘PARADE’ (EXCLUSIVE)
Parade, the 1998 Broadway musical featuring a Tony Award-winning score by the-then 28-year-old Jason Robert Brown, will be revived this spring by Greg Nobile’s Seaview Productions and Ambassador Theatre Group, according to a pitch deck distributed to investors.
Ben Platt (Dear Evan Hansen) will star in the dark historical drama, following an acclaimed weeklong tryout at New York City Center in November. Platt will reprise the role of Leo Frank, a Jewish Brooklynite transplanted to Marietta, Georgia, where he was falsely accused of murder and lynched by a mob in 1915. Micaela Diamond (The Cher Show), who earned stellar reviews playing Leo’s loyal wife, Lucille Frank, also returns to the cast. Platt, who like Diamond is Jewish, has spoken eloquently about the story’s timeliness amid rising antisemitism. Continue Reading
LEA MICHELE WILL REPLACE ‘FUNNY GIRL’ STAR BEANIE FELDSTEIN AS FANNY BRICE
People who need to see Lea Michele play Fanny Brice on Broadway are the luckiest people.
Lead producers Sonia Friedman, Scott Landis and David Babani announced today the Glee star is replacing Beanie Feldstein in Funny Girl beginning Sept. 6 at the August Wilson Theatre. Standby Julie Benko will play the lead Aug. 2 to Sept. 4 and for all Thursday evening performances starting on Sept. 8.Continue Reading
WILL ANGELS IN AMERICA MAKE ‘BACK TO THE FUTURE’ A BLAST ON BROADWAY? (EXCLUSIVE)
More than three decades after the chandelier first plunged at Phantom of the Opera and a helicopter flew out of Miss Saigon, a souped-up DeLorean will star in a planned Broadway transfer of the Olivier Award-winning musical Back to the Future.
Producer Colin Ingram is in talks to bring a big-budget adaptation of the 1985 Michael J. Fox blockbuster to a Shubert house next summer, people familiar with the London hit said. Last week, Ingram filed paperwork with the Securities and Exchange Commission to raise $23.5 million for the Broadway production. Co-producers of the show on the West End, which has been running for nine months and recently extended to February 2023, include the Frankel-Baruch-Viertel-Routh group, Hunter Arnold and Gavin Kalin — all familiar names around the Main Stem.Continue Reading
SONIA FRIEDMAN CONFIRMS BEANIE FELDSTEIN FOR ‘FUNNY GIRL’
The producers of the first Broadway revival of Funny Girl, planned for the spring of 2022, confirmed that Beanie Feldstein has been cast to play Fanny Brice, the role that made Barbra Streisand famous. Continue Reading
WILL ‘FUNNY GIRL’ REIGN OVER BROADWAY’S REVIVAL PARADE?
Broadway producers are people who need people — especially courageous people willing to congregate indoors during a pandemic. And maybe even get excited about a new take on a classic musical.
Four new musical revivals are expected on Broadway over the next eight months. The latest to throw its hat in the ring is Funny Girl, scheduled to begin performances on April 2, 2022, per a recent casting notice. It will star Beanie Feldstein (Booksmart), according to industry sources.Continue Reading
