Will Chase to Join Cast of Tony-Winning Billy Elliot

Will Chase will join the cast of Tony Award-winning Best Musical Billy Elliot as Tony, Billy’s older brother, on July 7 at the Imperial Theater. He replaces Santino Fontana, who is set to play Stanley Jerome in the fall revival of Neil Simon's Brighton Beach Memoirs and Broadway Bound.

Chase’s Broadway credits include The Story of My Life, Rent, High Fidelity, Lennon, Aida, The Full Monty and Miss Saigon. Off-Broadway, he has appeared in The Burnt Part Boys. Regional credits include Kiss of the Spider Woman (Signature Theatre), Oklahoma! (Oklahoma Lyric), The Pajama Game (St. Louis MUNY) and Andrew Lippa’s A Little Princess (TheaterWorks). His various film and TV credits include Rent: Filmed Live on Broadway, Everyday People, Shaft, Cupid, Rescue Me, Law and Order: Criminal Intent, Third Watch, Guiding Light and All My Children.

Billy Elliot currently features David Alvarez, Tommy Batchelor,Trent Kowalik and Kiril Kulish as Billy, Haydn Gwynne as Mrs. Wilkinson, Gregory Jbara as Dad and Carole Shelley as Grandma.

Billy Elliot is the heartwarming tale of a young boy with a dream, and a celebration of his triumph against the odds. Set against the historic British miners’ strike of the 1980s, the story follows Billy’s journey as a boy in a small mining town who, after stumbling across a ballet class while on his way to a boxing lesson, realizes that his future lay not in the boxing ring but on stage as a dancer.

The musical was the recent winner of ten 2009 Tony Awards.