Paradise Found, Directed by Prince and Stroman, to Debut in London Before Hitting Broadway

Details are emerging about Paradise Found, the new musical that director Harold Prince discussed with Broadway.com on September 16 after the 9,000th performance of The Phantom of the Opera. Variety reports that Susan Stroman will co-direct the show, which will begin rehearsals in April 2010 for a seven-week run at London’s Menier Chocolate Factory before opening on Broadway.

Prince elaborated to The New York Times that previews will begin in London on May 26, 2010, with opening night to follow nine performances later on June 2. The director noted that he had kept to a similarly abbreviated schedule when he directed Evita and Phantom. “In both cases, we did not change a single thing.” Stroman choreographed Prince’s 1994 Broadway revival of Show Boat before launching her directing career.

The cast of Paradise Found is expected to include Tony winners John Cullum, Mandy Patinkin, Shuler Hensley and Judy Kaye, plus Tony nominee Emily Skinner. Based on the novel The Tale of the 1002nd Night by Viennese author Joseph Roth, the show will feature a book by Richard Nelson, lyrics by Ellen Fitzhugh and music by Johann Strauss II, as adapted by Jonathan Tunick.

The story centers on an impotent Shah (Cullum) with 139 wives. The ruler's eunuch (Patinkin) convinces him to travel to Vienna, where the Shah falls in love with the empress of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

"I'm insisting that on this show we have only four producers, that we do it on a budget of $7 million and that we pay it off," Prince told Variety. The Times identified the producers as Jeff Berger, Tony Ponturo, Tim Kashani and Fran Kersmer.