Another yr, one other slate of starry revivals, diversifications and IP on Broadway. From Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal’s Othello to a Stephen Sondheim extravaganza, 2025 is shaping as much as be a yr of megawatt star energy on the Nice White Method. Listed here are 12 of essentially the most anticipated Broadway reveals of the yr:
English
Broadway kicks off the yr on a excessive with the return of Sanaz Toossi’s play English to New York in early January, after a profitable off-Broadway run in 2022 and the 2023 Pulitzer prize for drama. Set in an English-language classroom in Karaj, Iran, in 2008, the place grownup college students observe for the proficiency examination for their very own distinctive causes, the comedy explores the boundaries of language, our need to really feel understood and, in fact, the unfairly tough foibles of English.
Redwood
Contemporary off the theatrical success of Depraved, Idina Menzel returns to Broadway in a model new musical – a rarity today – co-conceived by her and playwright Tina Landau. Redwood, which premiered final yr to stable evaluations at San Diego’s La Jolla Playhouse, follows Menzel’s Jesse, a profitable businesswoman, mom and spouse who’s not defying gravity – an existential disaster, of types, compels her to journey deep into California’s historical Redwoods forest, on a therapeutic journey scored by Kate Diaz.
Othello
Maybe the starriest occasion throughout this starry Broadway season is Denzel Washington’s much-anticipated tackle Othello – a job he performed at 22, and nonetheless remembers by coronary heart 47 years later – towards Jake Gyllenhaal’s devilish Iago. English stage star Molly Osborne performs Desdemona, the topic of Othello’s damaging jealousy and Iago’s manipulative scheming. The basic Shakespeare tragedy, which has not been staged on Broadway since 1982, comes courtesy of director Kenny Leon for a strict 15-week residency starting 24 February in what is certain to be one of many hottest (and most costly) tickets of the season.
Good Night time, and Good Luck
One other main superstar fixture in midtown this yr: George Clooney, making his Broadway debut within the stage adaptation of his 2005 journalism drama Good Night time, and Good Luck. Clooney, who performed Fred W Pleasant in his sophomore directorial effort, will now tackle the function of journalist Edward R Murrow, a goal for Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anti-communist conspiracy hearings within the Nineteen Fifties. The stage adaptation, a preview of which options Clooney pointedly elevating the worth of “reality” (resonant!), will probably be directed by David Cromer, whose credit embody The Band’s Go to and A Streetcar Named Need, for a restricted run starting 12 March.
Goal
A yr after the Tony-winning revival of his play Applicable, Branden Jacobs-Jenkins is again with a brand new drama about advanced household dynamics. Goal, directed by two-time Tony winner Phylicia Rashad, comply with the Jaspers, a household of congressmen, pastors and civil rights leaders – a “pillar of Black American Politics”, based on the logline. However like each household, there are hidden cracks and secrets and techniques, upended when the youngest son, Nazareth, returns dwelling with an uninvited visitor in tow. The play opened to rave evaluations in Chicago final yr, and can start previews on the Hayes Theater in late February.
The Image of Dorian Grey with Sarah Snook
One other yr, one other much-hyped switch from the West Finish. Like Jodie Comer in Prima Facie in 2023, The Image of Dorian Grey gives Sarah Snook the chance to flex in a one-woman tour de pressure. Particularly, the Succession star takes on not one, not two, however 26 characters on this bombastic solo riff on Oscar Wilde’s Faustian story. The reportedly dazzling manufacturing – the Guardian’s Arifa Akbar described it as “mischievous, swaggering and operatic” – options a number of screens, wigs, pre-recorded footage and a stay movie crew, and opens on the Music Field Theatre on 27 March.
Glengarry Glen Ross
In one other celeb-studded revival with a status movie tie-in (are you sensing a theme?), David Mamet’s Pulitzer-winning 1984 play of warring Chicago real-estate brokers returns to Broadway this March. Directed by Patrick Marber, this revival – the primary since 2012, for a restricted 12-week run – will see Kieran Culkin, Bob Odenkirk, Invoice Burr and Michael McKean tackle the roles made well-known by Al Pacino, Jack Lemmon, Ed Harris and Alan Arkin within the 1992 movie model. Let the salesmanship video games start!
Smash
The cult-favorite musical TV present concerning the manufacturing of a brand new Broadway musical – Glee however for adults, as one buddy put it – has lastly achieved its huge break. Smash, the precise musical, opens on Broadway in April, that includes songs from the IYKYK sequence that ran for 2 seasons from 2012-2013. As within the NBC present, which starred Katharine McPhee, Debra Messing and Megan Hilty (at present at work in Broadway’s Loss of life Turns into Her), the Broadway model issues the event of Bombshell, a brand new musical about Marilyn Monroe, with no scarcity of aggressive divas.
The Final 5 Years
The Final 5 Years could also be a specific favourite of musical theater followers (with a 2014 movie adaptation starring Anna Kendrick in addition), but it surely’s nonetheless by no means been mounted on Broadway. Till now, starring former Broadway youngster actor Nick Jonas and erstwhile Tina Turner musical headliner Adrienne Warren. The musical, written by Jason Robert Brown and directed right here by Whitney White, tells the five-year story of a romantic relationship from two views: chronologically for author Jamie, and in reverse order for struggling actor Cathy – a full arc (or circle?) that Brown lately described as “superbly flamable”.
Stephen Sondheim’s Previous Mates
This revue of Sondheim’s music, starring Tony winners Bernadette Peters and Lea Salonga, transfers in March from a profitable, five-star heavy West Finish run (and on the heels of one other profitable Gypsy revival, starring Audra McDonald). A celebration of the late composer’s presents to musical theater that’s extra an ode to the passage of time than a narrative, this one is for the Broadway stalwarts and, naturally, music associates outdated and new.
Ready for Godot
From slackers to existentialism – Keanu Reeves marks yet one more A-list Broadway debut this fall when he and Alex Winter, his associate from Invoice & Ted’s Glorious Journey, tackle Samuel Beckett’s basic Ready for Godot. Reeves will play Estragon and Winter will play Vladimir on this story of two males ready/grappling with the which means of life directed by Jamie Lloyd, who most lately helmed a minimalist tackle Ibsen’s A Doll’s Home, starring Jessica Chastain, in 2023.
Simply in Time
Using excessive on his Tony this yr for Merrily We Roll Alongside, Jonathan Groff headlines a brand new (!) musical on the lifetime of Nineteen Fifties and 60s crooner Bobby Darin, singer of Past the Sea, Dream Lover and Mack the Knife, amongst different hits. The manufacturing, opening in April, will rework the roundabout Circle within the Sq. Theatre right into a mid-century nightclub for this biographical story of a teen idol turned celebrity working on borrowed time – Darin suffered from coronary heart circumstances all through his life, and died in 1973 at age 37.
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