Director Francesca Zambello's musical version of Rebecca, a hit in Vienna since its world premiere in 2006, is eyeing a Broadway debut in 2010. The newly formed production entity Global Broadway Inc., formed by Ben Sprecher and Louise Forlenza, has signed a deal with the Vereinigte Buhnen Wien Theatre to bring Zambello's production to New York.
Based on the classic Daphne Du Maurier novel, which was adapted into an Academy Award-winning film in 1940 by Alfred Hitchcock starring Laurence Olivier and Joan Fontaine, the new musical features a book and lyrics by Michael Kunze and music by Sylvester Levay. In addition to Vienna, Rebecca is currently playing in Tokyo and will open in Berlin and Helsinki in the next few months.
Zambello, currently represented on Broadway by The Little Mermaid, directed the new musical Little House on the Prairie, which had its world premiere in August at the Guthrie Theatre in Minneapolis. She will helm the musical adaptation of yet another well-known feature film, The First Wives Club, in a pre-Broadway run at the Old Globe Theatre next summer.
