by Nathaniel R
Patti Lupone in "Company"
When Broadway was shut down on March 12th, 2020 the official story was "until April 12th, 2020". That one month time frame is hilariously optimistic in retrospect (and even raised some eyebrows at the time). Cut to mid May 2021 and Broadway is still closed but with notice that theaters can reopen at full capacity in September.
But what gives with the Tony Awards? They announced a strange set of nominees after the Broadway closing culled from a very limited pool of shows since a lot hadn't yet opened (Broadway is typically busiest in the spring). Seven months later they still haven't uttered a peep about when those awards will take place. Aaron Tveit, the only nominee for Best Actor in a Musical, still doesn't know whether or not he won. All three of the current nominees in the marquee Tony category of Best Musical (i.e. the one that gets all the headlines and makes the box office difference) will be reopened by late October...
If a show has an asterisk by it, it will be eligible for the 2022 Tony season...provided these openings actually happen.
BROADWAY IN THE FALL
- Chicago: The Musical The 1997 Best Musical Revival winner, the longest running revival of all time, returns on September 14th for its 9,693rd performance
- Hamilton - the 2016 Best Musical winner resumes on September 14th
- Wicked - The 2004 blockbuster resumes on September 14th
- Come From Away the 2017 hit resumes on Tues September 21st
- Six* resumes previews on September 21st
- Aladdin - The 2014 musical resumes on September 28th
- Caroline or Change* the revival of the undervalued 2004 musical begins previews on October 8th
- Tina: The Tina Turner Musical resumes on October 8th (current best musical nominee)
- Trouble in Mind* a new play by Alice Childress begins previews on October 9th
- Aint Too Proud to Beg resumes on October 16th
- Jagged Little Pill resumes on October 21st (current best musical nominee)
- Mrs Doubtfire: The Musical* resumes previews on October 21st
- Phantom of the Opera The 1988 Best Musical winner, the longest running show of all time (sigh) resumes on October 22nd for its 13,371st performance. Even COVID couldn't kill it 30+ years into its run
Tony Yazbeck, one of our favourite Broadway stars, will be playing Cary Grant in the new musical "Flying Over Sunset"
- Flying Over Sunset* a new fictional musical about real life famous writers and actors experimenting with LSD begins previews on November 4th (it was scheduled to due start previews just as the shutdown began)
- Diana The Musical* about Princess Di begins previews on December 1st
- Dear Evan Hansen - The 2017 Best Musical winner resumes on December 11th
- Company* the buzzy gender-swapped revival of Sondheim's classic resumes previews on Monday, December 20th though only two of the 2020 cast (Katrina Lenk and Patti Lupone) are confirmed to continue on thus far
NO WORD YET
- Book of Mormon - The 2011 Best Musical winner
- Hadestown - the 2019 Best Musical winner
- The Lion King - The 1998 Best Musical winner
- Plaza Suite* - a revival of the comedy to star Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker was pushed back a year but that date came and went and still no Broadway
- A Soldiers Play - (current best revival nominee) but we suspect it was nearing the end of its run so its return seems unlikely
- West Side Story* - The show had just gotten started so we can't imagine they won't reopen with the new movie version opening at Christmas time that will only add to the fervor for this beloved property
BROADWAY IN EARLY 2022
The Take Me Out revival originally scheduled for spring 2020 will now be spring 2022
- Birthday Candles* a play starring Debra Messing begins previews March 18th (originally intended for spring 2020)
- Romeo & Bernadette* an Off Broadway hit musical comedy transfers to Broadway in the spring. Dates TBA
- Sing Street* - a musical adaptation. Dates TBA (originally intended for spring 2020)
- Take Me Out* - a revival of the 2003 gay athlete Tony-winning play with that infamous super long nude shower scene. Jesse Williams and Jesse Tyler Ferguson were signed to play the roles that resulted in a Tony win and Tony nomination for Denis O'Hare and Daniel Sunjata, respectively, in the original production. But since the production was pushed back two years there is no word on if that cast is still intact.
NEW SHOWS THAT WILL NOT BE RESUMING PREVIEWS
- Hangmen - Martin McDonagh play starring Dan Stevens
- The Inheritance - (current best play nominee) had already scheduled a closing date but COVID closed it earlier than that
- Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf - revival starring Laurie Metcalf and Rupert Everett
OLDER SHOWS THAT WILL NOT REOPEN
- Beetlejuice the Musical - the musical had been playing for a year but was already scheduled to lose its theater
- Frozen -Disney was the first to announce an official cancellation during the shutdown when all shows were forced to close "temporarily". The show had run for two years but Disney felt the market for Broadway's return would be too shaky for all three Disney productions (and Aladdin and The Lion King were far more popular)
- Mean Girls the Musical - the adaptation will not return after a two year run
OFF BROADWAY SIDE NOTE
Off Broadway is too enormous to get a bead on yet. There can only ever be 41 Broadway shows at any given time given the limited amount of theaters that size but there are hundreds of Off Broadway productions. One production we wanted to alert you to is that there is a new operatic adaptation of Intimate Apparel scheduled for January 2022. If the name sounds vaguely familiar it's because it was already playing right before the shutdown and, more famously, it was an Off Broadway hit in 2004 that was an early breakout for two rising actors: Viola Davis & Corey Stoll. Viola was already a Tony winner via King Hedley II but only just starting to get supporting film roles. She became a Triple Crown superstar over the following dozen years and Corey broke out by 2011 via an attention grabbing small role in Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris and is consistently in demand now. Just rewards for two totally brilliant actors.
The play turned opera is about a lingerie seamstress in 1905 who falls into a letter writing romance with a mysterious suitor. Kearstin Piper Brown stars in the new opera as the seamstress.