Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth to Star in The Addams Family
Two-time Tony Award winners Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth will star as Gomez and Morticia Addams in the new Broadway musical version of The Addams Family. Previews will begin on March 4, 2010, at a Nederlander theater to be announced, with opening night set for April 8, directed and designed by Phelim McDermott and Julian Crouch, the duo behind Shockheaded Peter and the Metropolitan Opera’s Satyagraha. A pre-Broadway engagement will play Chicago’s Ford Center for the Performing Arts, Oriental Theatre, beginning November 13.
Joining Lane and Neuwirth will two-time Tony Award nominee Terrence Mann Beauty and the Beast, Les Miserables as Mal Beineke, two-time Tony Award nominee Carolee Carmello Parade, Lestat, Mamma Mia! as Alice Beineke, two-time Tony Award nominee Kevin Chamberlin Seussical, Dirty Blonde as Uncle Fester, Jackie Hoffman Hairspray, Xanadu as Grandmama, Zachary James South Pacific as Lurch, Adam Riegler Shrek the Musical as Pugsley, Wesley Taylor 2009 Theatre World Award winner and Outer Critics’ Circle nominee for Rock of Ages as Lucas Beineke and Krysta Rodriguez In the Heights, Spring Awakening as Wednesday.
The Addams Family will feature a book by the Jersey Boys team of Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice and music and lyrics by Andrew Lippa The Wild Party. Choreography will be by Sergio Trujillo Next to Normal, Jersey Boys.
Based on the characters created by Charles Addams, The Addams Family begins as storm clouds are gathering over the clan’s manse. Daughter Wednesday, now 18, is experiencing a sensation that surprises and disgusts her—caring about another person. Young Pugsley, jealous of his sister’s attention, begs her to keep torturing him, severely, while mother Morticia, conflicted over her daughter’s lurch into womanhood, fears being upstaged and discarded, like yesterday’s road kill. All the while, father Gomez—master of the revels, mischievous and oblivious as ever—would prefer everything and everyone remain as it is. But when outsiders come to dinner, the events of one night will change forever this famously macabre family.
Lane, who is currently starring in the Broadway revival of Waiting for Godot, won Tony Awards for A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum and The Producers and was nominated for a Tony for Guys and Dolls. His Broadway credits include November, Butley, The Odd Couple, The Frogs, Love! Valour! Compassion!, Laughter on the 23rd Floor, On Borrowed Time, Some Americans Abroad, The Wind in the Willows, Merlin and Present Laughter. His off-Broadway credits include Dedication, The Lisbon Traviata, Lips Together Teeth Apart, The Common Pursuit and many others. Lane has won two Emmy Awards and a People’s Choice Award.
Neuwirth won a Tony for Sweet Charity and for playing Velma Kelly in the current revival of Chicago, production she later returned to as Roxie Hart. Her other Broadway credits include Fosse, Damn Yankees, Dancin’, Little Me and A Chorus Line. Regional theater productions including West Side Story, the title role in Kiss of the Spider Woman on London’s West End, The Threepenny Opera and Katherine in The Taming of the Shrew. Her off-Broadway credits include Here’s Lies Jenny, and she appears with symphonies across the country in Bebe Sings Weill and Kander & Ebb. Neuwirth won two Emmy Awards for playing Lilith on Cheers.
The Addams Family is produced by Stuart Oken, Roy Furman, Michael Leavitt and Five Cent Productions, by special arrangement with Elephant Eye Theatrical.
