Jeffrey Kuhn to Take on the Role of Boq in Wicked

Assassins star Jeffrey Kuhn will be the next Boq in Wicked. He is replacing Christopher Fitzgerald, who is departing on January 9 with Idina Menzel and Joey McIntyre.

"I am so excited to do something that is so entirely different from Assassins," Kuhn told Broadway.com. "I just recently saw the show and enjoyed it very much. We should all be so lucky as to be in something that is so revered and loved by people."

Kuhn is currently appearing in A.R. Gurney's The Fourth Wall at the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta. He is best know for playing Giuseppe Zangara, the man who tried to assassinate President Franklin D. Roosevelt and died in the electric chair, in last season's Broadway mounting of Assassins, which was directed by Wicked helmer Joe Mantello. He also appeared on the Great White Way in Ragtime. His other theater credits in the U.S. include Dirty Blonde, Reduced Shakespeare Company's The Bible Abridged and Lady in the Dark. A native of Canada, he has done most of his work there. His credits in his homeland include The Lion King, The Who's Tommy, Nothing Sacred, Love's Labour's Lost, Antony and Cleopatra, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Timon of Athens, The Illusion and Treasure Island.

"I'm a huge Mantello fan," Kuhn added. "I would walk across broken glass for Joe Mantello. He kept offering to buy me a ticket to go see [Wicked], but he gave me a job instead."

Wicked will continue to star Jennifer Laura Thompson, George Hearn, Carole Shelley and Michelle Federer. Replacements for Menzel and McIntyre have not yet been announced.