The Wiz, now running at the Marquis Theatre, will release a 2024 Broadway Cast Recording on July 12 through Immersive/Interscope Records. The Broadway revival, directed by Schele Williams, opened April 17 following a 13-city North American tour.  An all-Black retelling of L. Frank Baum’s The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Wiz debuted on Broadway in 1975. The revival presents Tony nominee Joseph Joubert's arrangements and orchestrations of Charlie Smalls' original Tony-winning score, with music and vocal arrangements by Allen René Louis. Tony nominee Amber Ruffin lends new material to the original book by William F. Brown. Choreography is by JaQuel Knight. Featuring such beloved numbers as “Ease On Down the Road,” “Be A Lion,” “Home” and “Brand New Day,” the show stars Nichelle Lewis as Dorothy, Deborah Cox as Glinda, Melody A. Betts as Aunt Em/Evillene, Kyle Ramar Freeman as the Lion, Phillip Johnson Richardson as the Tinman, Avery Wilson as the Scarecrow and Wayne Brady as The Wiz. The ensemble includes Lauryn Adams, Maya Bowles, Shayla Alayre Caldwell, Jay Copeland, Allyson Kaye Daniel, Judith Franklin, Michael Samarie George, Collin Heyward, Amber Jackson, Olivia Jackson, Christina Jones, Polanco Jones, Kolby Kindle, Mariah Lyttle, Kareem Marsh, Alan Mingo, Jr., Anthony Murphy, Dustin …

In 2015, the British Medical Journal published a study on a phenomenon that the researchers observed among highly ranked Russian political figures and officials, including President Vladimir Putin: a distinctive gait characterized by a reduced swinging of the right arm. The researchers attributed the movement to K.G.B. weapons training, which enables the trainee to swiftly access a firearm. The researchers called it “gunslinger’s gait.” That very specific way of walking, with its eerie combination of swagger and stillness, is just one of the physical trademarks that the British actor Will Keen mastered in order to play Vladimir Putin on stage. “It’s a strangely empowering kind of walk,” he said. A tense political thriller written by The Crown creator Peter Morgan and directed by Rupert Goold, Patriots charts the rise of the man who was, seemingly overnight, handed the reins of power to Russia. It also tells the story of billionaire oligarch-turned-Kremlin insider Boris Berezovsky, played by Michael Stuhlbarg on Broadway, who orchestrates Putin’s rise, only to seriously regret it. The play premiered at the Almeida Theatre in London before a run on the West End in 2023. Keen won an Olivier Award for his performance. Keen channels the Russian president …

Tony Award winners Renée Elise Goldsberry and Jesse Tyler Ferguson will announce the nominations for the 77th Annual Tony Awards. The announcement will air live from Sofitel New York on the Tony Awards' official YouTube page on April 30 beginning at 9:00 AM ET, with announcements for select categories broadcast live on CBS Mornings beginning at 8:30 AM ET. A complete list of the 2024 nominations will be available at TonyAwards.com immediately following the announcement. Goldsberry is currently starring in the Netflix comedy Girls5eva. She won her Tony Award in 2016 for originating the role of Angelica Schuyler in Hamilton. A documentary about her life, Satisfied, will premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in June. Ferguson’s Broadway credits include On the Town, The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and, most recently, Take Me Out, for which he earned his Tony Award in 2022. As previously announced, the 77th Annual Tony Awards ceremony will be broadcast live from the David H. Koch Theater at Lincoln Center on June 16, hosted by Ariana DeBose. The ceremony will air on the CBS Television Network and stream on Paramount+ in the U.S.  

Phillip Johnson Richardson goes on a quest for a heart eight times a week at the Marquis Theatre as The Wiz's beloved Tinman. The role marks Richardson's Broadway debut, and a star-making one at that given the classic Charlie Smalls number he croons to the back row to showstopping effect. "What Would I Do If I Could Feel" is the Tinman's yearning ballad for human emotion—something Richardson has plenty of in his rendition. Take a look below at his performance inside the Broadway.com studio, accompanied by Paul Byssainthe, Jr. on piano, and see if you don't feel your own heart grow a few sizes.

The world-premiere musical Millions, inspired by Frank Cottrell Boyce’s 2004 novel and film, will be the final production of the Alliance Theatre's 2024-25 season. Described as a modern-day fable, the musical features a creative team of Tony Award winners, with a book by Bob Martin, a score by Adam Guettel and direction by Bartlett Sher. Performances will run from May 10 through June 15, 2025 on the Atlanta theater's Coca-Cola Stage. Millions tells the story of two brothers, their newly widowed father, a train robber and (possibly) a miracle. Damien and Anthony are dealing with the loss of their mother in very different ways. So, when a duffel bag of cash falls out of the sky, Damien thinks it’s a miracle from his mom, sent to test their goodness. But Anthony knows the truth. Martin earned a 2006 Tony Award for his book for The Drowsy Chaperone, and earned another nomination in 2019 for penning the book for The Prom. Guettel was represented on Broadway this season by his score for Days of Wine and Roses. It was his second Broadway musical, following his 2005 Tony-winning Broadway debut as composer of The Light in the Piazza. Sher, a nine-time Tony nominee …

Mary Jane, starring Academy Award nominee Rachel McAdams in her Broadway debut, has extended its run at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre by two weeks. The show, which had its official opening on April 23, will now conclude its run on June 16. The affecting play is the story of a single mother who faces an impossible family situation with unflagging optimism and humor while drawing on the wisdom of the women around her. The play is written by Pulitzer Prize finalist Amy Herzog, who also adapted this season’s An Enemy of the People, and directed by Anne Kauffman. McAdams is joined on stage by April Matthis, Susan Pourfar, Lily Santiago and Brenda Wehle. The show features scenic design by Lael Jellinek, costumes by Brenda Abbandandolo, lighting design by Ben Stanton and sound design by Leah Gelpe.

Merrily We Roll Along, Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s reverse chronological musical about the heartbreak of growing up, is often touted as a piece for a trio. Katie Rose Clarke, however, makes for a powerful fourth in the Mary-Frank-Charley unit, taking on the role of Frank’s wife Beth—the one who gets to pull Broadway audiences’ heartstrings nightly with the ballad “Not a Day Goes By.” Clarke made her Broadway debut nearly 20 years ago as Clara in The Light in the Piazza, assuming the daunting responsibility of replacing Kelli O’Hara in her star-making role—and all before she even graduated college. It clearly went well enough: To this day, she holds the title of Wicked’s longest-running Glinda (a show in which she got to perform opposite her current Merrily castmate Lindsay Mendez). She also originated the role of Hannah Campbell in the 2015 musical Allegiance, which starred Miss Saigon’s original Kim, Lea Salonga—a portent of Clarke's performance as Ellen in Miss Saigon's 2017 revival. It’s been an eventful 20 years in the Broadway community, and Clarke marked the milestone with a special appearance on The Broadway Show. Watch as she takes Broadway.com Editor-in-Chief Paul Wontorek …

Over the course of her Broadway career, the actress Jessica Lange—displaying what seems like the single-minded methodicalness of an assassin—checked off the classics of the American stage, one after the other. After her Broadway debut in 1992, playing Blanche DuBois opposite Alec Baldwin's Stanley Kowalski in A Streetcar Named Desire, she played Amanda in The Glass Menagerie in 2005 and Mary Tyrone in Long Day’s Journey into Night in 2016. Lange won a Tony Award for the latter. "Lange is entirely free onstage," the New Yorker said of that performance. Making her return to the stage after a seven-year absence, she’s excited to try something new: the world premiere of a newly written play. “That, coupled with what a great play I think it is, was what attracted me to doing it,” Lange told Tamsan Fadal for The Broadway Show on a break during the final week of rehearsals. “Creating something nobody's seen before, there'll be no way to compare it to anything. So that in itself, it's exciting.” Written by Pulitzer Prize winner Paula Vogel, Mother Play covers four decades' worth of history, including five evictions, in the lives of a single family. Lange plays the hardened …

The search for Broadway's Biggest Fan is over. After the Broadway.com staff watched all of the video submissions, former Broadway.com vloggers Michael James Scott and Casey Likes, along with current Broadway.com vlogger Isabelle McCalla, convened to select the winner. They selected Molly Carter from Fort Pierce, Florida, who’ll be visiting Broadway in person for the first time. Molly wins roundtrip airfare for two to New York City, two tickets to three current Broadway shows (Aladdin, Back to the Future and Water for Elephants), a three-night hotel stay at a 4-star Midtown hotel in New York City and a prize bag filled with Broadway merchandise. She'll also feature in an upcoming segment on The Broadway Show with Tamsen Fadal. Watch the video below to see Iglehart, McCalla and Likes deliberate over the final five contestants. And check out Molly's winning submission below.

Age: 29 Hometown: Houston, Texas Current Role: Trey Curtis plays Alexander Hamilton in the Broadway cast of Lin-Manuel Miranda's Hamilton.  Credits: Curtis made his professional acting debut in the Facebook Watch series Five Points. He performed in the third national tour of Hamilton, which traveled to Puerto Rico and featured the show’s creator, Lin-Manuel Miranda, in the title role. Before landing that role himself on Broadway, Curtis understudied a number of the principal roles at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, including John Laurens/Philip Hamilton, Marquis de Lafayette/Thomas Jefferson and Hercules Mulligan/James Madison. Curtis records and releases his own music as TREY. Happiness Is... Raised an only child, Curtis regularly found himself with free time on his hands. “I would just play with my toys and make my own musicals, my own concerts, my own lore,” he says. His mother, who worked at Houston’s Theatre Under the Stars, naturally assumed the stage was the place for him. And yet, “It didn't translate smoothly for me—doing the real-life thing,” he recalls. “It was hard for me to make friends growing up in theater, because no one really looked like me. And as a young boy growing up, that was …

Opening-night celebrations abound this week on The Broadway Show with Tamsen Fadal. But amid all the carousing, we still found time to check in on old friends, peek inside Broadway’s glitziest new musical and enjoy an exclusive in-studio performance from a citizen of Oz. Oscar, Emmy and Tony Award winner Jessica Lange, star of Paula Vogel’s Mother Play, sits down with host Fadal for a conversation about her latest Broadway project. Hear how she’s settling in as matriarch of Paula Vogel’s challenging family story. On the opening-night front, it’s back-to-back red-carpet revels: Join the resistance with Hillary Clinton and the cast of Shaina Taub’s Suffs; ease on down the press line at the opening of The Wiz; get your pulse up on the pink carpet with the stars of The Heart of Rock and Roll; get to know the band at the Broadway opening of Stereophonic; join Alicia Keys for a joyous Broadway evening at Hell’s Kitchen; and hear from Cabaret stars Eddie Redmayne and Gayle Rankin as they usher in the latest revival of Kander and Ebb’s musical masterpiece. Phillip Johnson Richardson (Photo by Luis Ferrá for Broadway.com) Katie Rose …

This year's instalment of Broadway Bares, the industry’s annual, one-night-only striptease event, is embracing a Las Vegas theme. Broadway Bares: Hit the Strip, created by director and choreographer Jerry Mitchell, will take place on June 23 at Hammerstein Ballroom. There will be two performances, at 9.30pm and midnight. As previously reported, the Pride Month event will be directed by The Lion King dance captain and veteran Broadway Bares performer Kellen Stancil, with Paula DeLuise as associate director. Stancil will be joined by the choreographers John Alix, Mike Baerga, Phil Colgan, Karla Puno Garcia, Billy Griffin, Amber Jackson, Jonathan Lee, Leo Moctezuma, Rachelle Rak, Michael Lee Scott and Maleek Washington. Performers are yet to be announced. The event is produced by and benefits Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. Last year’s edition raised $1.88 million, bringing Bares’ lifetime total to more than $26 million.

A new musical comedy created by Marla Mindelle, the writer and original star of the off-Broadway hit Titanique, will open off-Broadway. The Big Gay Jamboree, directed and choreographed by Connor Gallagher, features a book by Mindelle and Jonathan Parks-Ramage, with music and lyrics by Mindelle and Philip Drennen. Performances will begin at the Orpheum Theatre on September 14 with an official opening night set for October 1. In The Big Gay Jamboree, Mindelle plays Stacey, who wakes up hungover in an off-Broadway musical. With no memory of how she got there, Stacey is forced to put her BFA in theater to use, belt her face off and figure out how to escape this 1940s Golden Age musical while a live audience watches. The creative team includes dots (set design), Sarah Cubbage (costume design), Brian Tovar (lighting design), Justin Stasiw (sound design), Aaron Rhyne (projection design), and Leah J. Loukas (hair/wig design). Musical supervision and arrangements are by David Dabbon. Further casting will be announced at a later date. Mindelle won the 2023 Lucille Lortel Award and Obie for her portrayal of Céline Dion in Titanique. On Broadway, she has starred in Cinderella and Sister Act. …

The Great Gatsby, now running at the Broadway Theatre, will release an Original Broadway Cast Recording this summer with Sony Masterworks. Featuring music and lyrics by Tony Award nominees Jason Howland and Nathan Tysen, the digital album is set for release on June 21 with the physical CD arriving August 2. The CD is now available for pre-order. Directed by Marc Bruni, The Great Gatsby is a musical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's seminal American novel, set in Jazz-Age New York. The production stars Tony Award nominees Jeremy Jordan and Eva Noblezada as Jay Gatsby and Daisy Buchanan, along with Noah J. Ricketts as Nick Carraway, John Zdrojeski as Tom Buchanan, Samantha Pauly as Jordan Baker, Sara Chase as Myrtle Wilson, Eric Anderson as Meyer Wolfsheim and Paul Whitty as George Wilson. Kait Kerrigan pens the book and Dominique Kelley lends choreography. The creative team also includes sets and projection design by Paul Tate DePoo III, costume designs by Linda Cho, lighting design by Cory Pattak, sound design by Brian Ronan, music direction by Daniel Edmonds, orchestrations by Jason Howland and Kim Scharnberg and arrangements by Jason Howland.  

At the close of every Broadway season, fans across the globe bestow the most democratic theater award of the year. The Broadway.com Audience Choice Award is the only major theatrical prize awarded solely by votes cast online by audience members. Awards are presented in traditional categories along with several unique ones, including Favorite Diva Performance, Favorite New Song, Favorite Breakthrough Performance, Favorite Funny Performance and Favorite Onstage Pair. An award is also presented for national tours to encourage the participation of Broadway fans not only in New York but across the country. All awards are decided solely by the voting of theater fans on Broadway.com. Fans can vote to select this year’s nominees at Broadway.com. The winners will be revealed on May 20, followed by a celebratory cocktail reception on June 6. The full timeline is below: April 26 – Nominee voting opens May 2 – Nominee voting closes May 3 – Award voting opens May 19 – Award voting closes May 20 – Winners announced June 6 – Cocktail reception In recent years, the ceremony has featured Award winners Jessica Chastain, Hugh Jackman, Daniel Craig, Sarah Jessica Parker, Uma Thurman, Andrew Garfield, Tina …

Oh, Mary!, Cole Escola's hit downtown farce about First Lady Mary Todd Lincoln, will move to Broadway this summer for a limited engagement. Following its twice-extended world premiere at the Lucille Lortel Theatre, the production will take up residence at the Lyceum Theatre for 12 weeks. Previews begin June 26 ahead of a July 11 opening, with performances set to run through September 15.  Escola leads Oh, Mary! as a miserable, suffocated Mary Todd Lincoln in the weeks leading up to Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. Unrequited yearning, alcoholism and suppressed desires abound in this one act play that finally examines the forgotten life and dreams of Mrs. Lincoln through the lens of an idiot. The show also stars Conrad Ricamora as Mary’s Husband, James Scully as Mary’s Teacher, Bianca Leigh as Mary’s Chaperone, and Tony Macht as Mary’s Husband’s Assistant, with Hannah Solow and Peter Smith completing the cast. Sam Pinkleton directs. The Broadway creative team includes dots (scenic design), Holly Pierson (costume design), Cha See (lighting design), Daniel Kluger (sound design and original music), Drew Levy (sound design), Leah J. Loukas (wig design), Addison Heeren (props supervision) and David Dabbon (musical arrangements).

Illinoise, the dance-centric musical adaptation of Sufjan Stevens' album Illinois, opens April 24 at the St. James Theatre. Its matinee performance will mark both its very first Broadway performance and its official opening. Directed and choreographed by Tony Award winner Justin Peck with a book by Peck and Pulitzer Prize winner Jackie Sibblies Drury, Illinoise comes to Broadway following successful runs at Bard College's Fisher Center, Chicago Shakespeare Theater and New York City's Park Avenue Armory.  Set around an intimate campfire, Illinoise harnesses dance and music to delve into themes of self-exploration and community. The Broadway cast features Gaby Diaz (So You Think You Can Dance), Ben Cook (the Broadway production and 2021 film of West Side Story), Ricky Ubeda (the Broadway production and 2021 film of West Side Story), Yesenia Ayala, Kara Chan, Jeanette Delgado, Carlos Falu, Christine Flores, Jada German, Zachary Gonder, Rachel Lockhart, Brandt Martinez, Dario Natarelli, Tyrone Reese, Craig Salstein, Ahmad Simmons, Byron Tittle and Alejandro Vargas. The production's vocalists are Elijah Lyons, Shara Nova and Tasha Viets-VanLear, who performed in the Park Avenue Armory and Chicago Shakespeare Theater productions. Nova, who sang on the …

The nominees for the 2024 Outer Critics Circle Awards were announced today at a ceremony led by Merrily We Roll Along stars Daniel Radcliffe, Jonathan Groff and Lindsay Mendez at the Museum of Broadway. The off-Broadway musical Dead Outlaw leads with nine nominations, followed by The Connector with seven. Stereophonic, which also earned a total of seven nominations, is the most nominated Broadway production of the season.  The Outer Critics Circle is the official organization of writers on New York theater for out-of-town newspapers and national publications. This year's winners will be announced via press release on May 13, followed by an awards ceremony held on May 23. Read the complete list of nominees below. Outstanding New Broadway Play Jaja's African Hair Braiding by Jocelyn Bioh Mother Play: A Play in Five Evictions by Paula Vogel Patriots by Peter Morgan Stereophonic by David Adjmi The Shark Is Broken by Joseph Nixon and Ian Shaw Outstanding New Broadway Musical Days of Wine and Roses Suffs The Great Gatsby The Outsiders Water for Elephants Outstanding New Off-Broadway Musical Buena Vista Social Club Dead Outlaw Illinoise Teeth The Connector Outstanding New Off-Broadway Play Dig by Theresa Rebeck King of the …

Tony Award winner Lindsay Mendez married fellow actor J. Alex Brinson on April 22. Mendez’s Merrily We Roll Along co-stars, Tony Award nominee Jonathan Groff and Daniel Radcliffe—old friends as they are—served as officiant and ring-bearer, respectively. The ceremony took place at the Bethesda Terrace Arcade in Central Park, with Mendez’s three-year-old daughter Lucy as the flower girl. Mendez and Brinson were engaged on Christmas Day last year. As previously reported, the couple is expecting their first child together in the fall. Mendez, Groff and Radcliffe have been starring in Merrily We Roll Along together since the show's off-Broadway run at New York Theatre Workshop in 2022. The Broadway transfer opened at Hudson Theatre on October 10, 2023, with the production currently slated to run until July 7.

Tony Award winner Idina Menzel will launch a North American concert tour this summer, aptly titled the Take Me or Leave Me Tour, inspired by the popular duet she famously sang in Rent on Broadway. The tour will kick off July 19 in Seattle, WA before traveling to Los Angeles, New York, Las Vegas and more. Menzel's final performance is scheduled for August 18 in Greensboro, NC. The Take Me or Leave Me Tour, Menzel's first tour in nearly eight years, will feature music that spans the actor-singer's career. It will include music from her stage roles in Rent and Wicked, as well as her iconic vocal performance as Elsa in Disney's Frozen. Jazz standards and music from her solo albums—including her latest, Drama Queen—will also be included.  On Broadway, Menzel is best known for her Tony-nominated performance as Rent's original Maureen Johnson and her Tony-winning performance as Wicked's original Elphaba. She has also performed on Broadway in Aida and earned a Tony nomination for her leading role in the musical If/Then. Menzel recently premiered the new musical Redwood at La Jolla Playhouse.