Cate Blanchett, Josh Groban lead fall Broadway season
NEW YORK -- “Cats” is back on Broadway, purring along. “Hamilton” tickets are still hard to get. What else is new this fall? Some big celebrities are coming, including Cate Blanchett, Diane Lane, Janet McTeer, Josh Groban and Liev Schreiber. Here’s a look at some highlights of the first half of the 2016-17 Broadway season:
OLD SCHOOL TUNES
Producers raided the golden age of movie musicals to pull out a stage adaptation of the Bing Crosby-Fred Astaire 1942 film “Holiday Inn.” The Broadway cast is led by Bryce Pinkham, Lora Lee Gayer, Megan Lawrence, Megan Sikora and Corbin Bleu and it has 20 classic Berlin songs, including “Steppin’ Out With My Baby,” ‘’Shaking the Blues Away,” ‘’Easter Parade” and “Cheek to Cheek.” (Opens Oct. 6 at Studio 54)
SMALL TO BIG
One of the bravest -- or most foolhardy -- choices on Broadway will be the transfer of the somewhat fragile play “Heisenberg” from its perch at a 150-seat off-Broadway space to a 650-seat Broadway theater. The Simon Stephens play is only about 80 minutes, performed by just two people and with no real set. In the play, two strangers - a 33-year-old woman and a 75-year-old man - embark on an affair. Mary-Louise Parker and Denis Arndt had plenty of fireworks off-Broadway; it remains to be seen if they lose anything getting to the big time. (Previews begin Sept. 20 at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre)
WELCOME, QUEEN CATE
Cate Blanchett will make her Broadway debut in Anton Chekhov’s first - and long-forgotten - play. The Oscar winner will star opposite Richard Roxburgh in “The Present,” which centers on a woman celebrating her 40th birthday at her country summer home. Chekhov wrote it as a young medical student in the 1880s but it went nowhere and the playwright put it aside. It was unearthed in a Moscow bank vault in 1920. (Previews begin Dec. 17 at the Barrymore Theatre)
FEEL FAMILIAR, DIANE?
Diane Lane made her Broadway debut at age 12 in the 1977 revival of “The Cherry Orchard,” goofing around backstage with co-stars Raul Julia and Meryl Streep. Now she’s coming back in the same play. It’s a new adaptation of Anton Chekhov’s classic play by Tony Award-winner Stephen Karam, who wrote “The Humans.” The rest of the cast includes Tavi Gevinson, Chuck Cooper, John Glover, Celia Keenan-Bolger and Joel Grey. (Previews begin Sept. 15 at the American Airlines Theatre)
OLD MEDIA
Hello, sweetheart. Gimme rewrite: “The Front Page,” a jaundiced view of newspaper journalism from 1928, is coming back this fall in an era when print reporters are on the decline. The cast - including Nathan Lane, John Slattery, John Goodman, Jefferson Mays, Rosemary Harris and Sherie Rene Scott - will be no doubt be fast-talking and wise-cracking. Whether they can avoid the now-massive clichés in the script is another matter. (Previews begin Oct. 8 at the Booth Theatre)
NEW MEDIA
If “The Front Page” celebrates old mainstream media, the musical “Dear Even Hansen” does the same for the digital age. It stars the appealing Ben Platt of “Pitch Perfect” and has great songs by the duo Benj Pasek and Justin Paul. In the musical, a misfit teen writes a private letter to himself that accidentally goes viral, with astounding results. Whether this smallish show will wilt or thrive under Broadway lights is up for debate. (Previews begin in November at the Belasco Theatre)
CULT FAVORITE
True theater geeks will adore the news that “Falsettos” is being revived. The William Finn-James Lapine show is actually the pairing of two one-act musicals written nearly a decade apart “Falsettos” follows Marvin as he struggles to create a family out of his eclectic relationships that includes his ex-wife, his new boyfriend, his adolescent son and his psychiatrist. The revival stars Christian Borle, Stephanie J. Block, Tracie Thoms and Andrew Rannells. (Previews begin Sept. 29 at the Walter Kerr Theatre)
SCHEMING SEDUCERS
The second Broadway revival of “Les Liaisons Dangereuses,” a play about power and seduction in 18th century France, will return this fall from London, starring Janet McTeer and Liev Schreiber. Christopher Hampton’s dark comedy became an award-winning sensation in London and on Broadway in 1985, followed by the 1988 film starring Glenn Close, John Malkovich and Michelle Pfeiffer. (Performances begin Oct. 8 at the Booth Theatre)
WATCH THE CLOSING DOORS
Some of the folks behind the films “Frozen” and “Pitch Perfect,” have combined for a new musical - “In Transit,” an a cappella romantic comedy set in the New York City subway. The show has a book, music and lyrics co-written by Academy Award winner Kristen Anderson-Lopez of “Frozen” fame and vocal arrangements are by Deke Sharon, of the “Pitch Perfect” movies. Kathleen Marshall will direct. (Previews begin Nov. 10 at the Circle in the Square Theatre)
HEY, TAXI!
From the subways to the street, Broadway will feature taxis in the only one of two-time Pulitzer Prize winner August Wilson’s plays in his The American Century Cycle that hasn’t been seen on Broadway until now. “Jitney” centers on a group of men trying to eke out a living by driving unlicensed cabs, or jitneys. Ruben Santiago-Hudson will direct. (Previews begin Dec. 28 at Samuel J. Friedman Theatre)