Dead Accounts Star Katie Holmes Gushes About the Thrill of ‘Saturday Night on Broadway’

Gossip mags have had plenty to say about Katie Holmes over the last few months, but this fall the actress is focusing her creative energies on the stage as she readies to join Tony winner Norbert Leo Butz in Dead Accounts, a new comedy from Smash and Seminar writer Theresa Rebeck .

“Katie Holmes [is] a multi-layered, very sophisticated young woman, and I can’t wait to see the results,” the show's director Jack O’Brien said of his leading lady in a new interview with EW.com. “The leading character is over the top, fascinating, heartbreaking, a brilliant con man, and a series of surprises," he continued. "The answer to that: Norbert Leo Butz.”

In Dead Accounts, Holmes stars as Lorna, the high-strung sister of a con man (Butz) whose sudden return home—with millions of dollars in hand—launches his family into a comedic, money-charged frenzy.

“What audiences are going to get is something different every night,” said Holmes, who made her Broadway debut four years ago in All My Sons. “I was very excited to work with Jack. And [Norbert]. I’m really thrilled. You’re in your dressing room, they say 'It’s Saturday night on Broadway! It’s so exciting!”

Holmes will duke it out onstage with two-time Tony winner Butz, whose explosive stage presence earned him Broadway’s highest honors in Catch Me If You Can and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels. “The behavior is funny. [Rebeck] doesn’t write jokes. It’s knee-jerk, and then they might backpedal,” said Butz in praise of the show’s much buzzed-about playwright.

“I’m really excited to be working with Theresa,” added Holmes. “I think her writing is wonderful because the characters are real and going through things that we as the audience really recognize. We are very lucky people.”

Dead Accounts begins preview performances on November 3 at the Music Box Theatre, with opening night scheduled for November 29.