Stephen Sondheim and Wynton Marsalis’ Collaboration Gets Name Change and Choreographer

The creative team for Encores! new Stephen Sondheim/Wynton Marsalis musical is coming together. Joining Tony-winning director John Doyle is choreographer Parker Esse. The show, which has been changed from A Bed and a Chair: A New York Love Story to a A Bed and a Chair: A New York Affair, will play New York City Center from November 13 through November 17.

Conceived by Peter Gethers, Jack Viertel and Doyle, A Bed and a Chair: A New York Affair celebrates the love of all things New York. The program will feature more than two-dozen Sondheim compositions, each piece newly reimagined by the unique musical sensibility of nine-time Grammy-winning trumpet player and bandleader Marsalis and Marsalis’ Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. Singers from both jazz and Broadway backgrounds will participate. Casting will be announced in the coming weeks.

Esse was the associate choreographer under Warren Carlyle for Broadway’s Finian’s Rainbow and A Tale of Two Cities. He was a performer in the Tony-winning production of Fosse. His regional choreography credits at the Arena Stage, Kennedy Center and Goodspeed Opera House include Mame, Carousel, The Most Happy Fella, Guys & Dolls, Follies, The Music Man and Oklahoma!.

Sondheim is an eight-time Tony winner and the composer and lyricist of  Into the Woods, Sunday in the Park With George, Merrily We Roll Along, Company, Anyone Sweeney Todd, Passion, A Little Night Music, Follies, Assassins, Pacific Overtures, The Frogs, Can Whistle and A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. He wrote lyrics for West Side Story, Gypsy, Do I Hear a Waltz? and additional lyrics for Candide.

Marsalis serves as the managing and artistic director at Jazz at Lincoln Center. He has recorded more than 70 jazz and classical recordings. He is the first jazz artist to be awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Music, for Blood on the Fields, commissioned by Jazz at Lincoln Center.