Tony Winner Jessie Mueller Will Headline Sara Bareilles’ Waitress Musical at American Repertory Theater

Broadway.com has confirmed that Tony winner Jessie Mueller, after starring as Jenna in a December workshop of the new Waitress musical, will reprise her performance in the previously announced premiere at Massachusetts’ American Repertory Theater. A.R.T. Artistic Director Diane Paulus will helm the production, which begins performances on August 1. The show features a score by Grammy nominee Sara Bareilles and a book by Jessie Nelson.

“Sara’s music is exceptional,” the Beautiful alum recently told Broadway.com of the original score. “She’s been as involved in the process as the rest of us were. It was very refreshing to see her changing her work along with what we were doing—whether it was an acting moment that changed the lyric or vice versa.”

As for the upcoming A.R.T. run, which begins rehearsals in June, Mueller says, “I’m sure there will be a lot of new things I don’t even know about yet, but that’s part of the fun. You show up and ask, ‘Where are we are now?' and just go from there.”

In addition to her Tony-winning performance as the titular singer/songwriter in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical, Mueller has appeared on Broadway in On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (for which she also received a Tony nod,) Nice Work If You Can Get It and The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Her additional credits include Into the Woods in Central Park and the New York Philharmonic’s Carousel.

Waitress follows Jenna, a pregnant waitress in the south trapped in an abusive marriage and looking for a happy ending. She finds relief—and potentially that happy ending—by making creatively-titled pies and forming a romance with an unlikely newcomer. Additional casting will be revealed at a later date.