Gigi Returns! Reimagined Production Heading to Broadway During 2014-15 Season

Gigi is packing her bags and heading to Broadway! The 1973 Alan Jay Lerner and Frederick Loewe musical will be revived in the 2014-15 season at a theater yet to be announced, featuring a new adaptation by playwright and Emmy-nominated screenwriter Heidi Thomas (Upstairs Downstairs). No casting has been announced. A developmental reading will take place in New York City in April. Eric D. Schaeffer will direct. 

“Gigi lets us escape to an idyllic place where the girl gets the guy and love does conquer all,” producer Jenna Segal said in a statement. “Heidi Thomas has restored Gigi to her rightful place at the center of the story, backed by a funny, warm family of women that show the men in the world around them the finer meaning of life and love.”

Set in the turn of the 20th century, Gigi tells the story of a free-spirited teenage girl living in Paris who is groomed (in the custom of her family) to serve as a companion to a bored, wealthy playboy named Gaston until the two unexpectedly realize they have fallen in love. The musical is based on the novella Gigi by Colette, the 1951 play by Anita Loos and the 1958 film musical of the same name, starring Leslie Caron as Gigi and Louis Jourdan as Gaston. The movie earned a then-record-setting nine Academy Awards, including Best Picture.

Following the success of the film, a short-lived Broadway production premiered at the Uris Theatre in November 1973, starring Karin Wolfe as Gigi and Daniel Massey as Gaston. Lerner and Loewe earned a Tony Award for Best Original Score. The production shuttered in February 1974 after 103 performances.

Get a crash course in Gigi! Click below to see a trailer for the 1958 film.