After a West End engagement, Chichester Festival Theatre’s acclaimed revival of Caroline, or Change will transfer to Broadway. Performances of the Michael Longhurst-directed production will begin March 13, 2020, before an April 7 opening night at Roundabout Theatre Company's Studio 54.
Olivier Award winner Sharon D. Clarke, recently seen on the London stage in Death of a Salesman, will reprise her performance in the title role of Caroline Thibodeaux, a black woman working as a maid for a white Jewish family in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement.
The musical, featuring a score by Jeanine Tesori and a book and lyrics by Tony Kushner, premiered at the Public Theater Off-Broadway in 2003 before transferring to Broadway the following year. The production earned Anika Noni Rose a Tony Award, as well as nominations for star Tonya Pinkins, Tesori and Kushner, and director George C. Wolfe.
The staging features choreography by Ann Yee, sets and costumes by Fly Davis, lighting by Jack Knowles, sound design by Paul Arditti, and music supervision by Nigel Lilley. Chris Fenwick serves as music director.
Prior to Caroline, or Change, Roundabout will present the Broadway premiere of Charles Fuller's A Soldier's Play. Tony winner Kenny Leon will direct the Pulitzer Prize-winning crime drama, with Tony nominee David Alan Grier (The Gerhswins' Porgy and Bess, Race, The First) and Blair Underwood (A Streetcar Named Desire) starring as Sergeant Vernon C. Waters and Captain Richard Davenport, respectively.
Grier returns to the play, inspired by Herman Melville's Billy Budd and set in 1944 Louisiana as the military remains segregated, after appearing in its 1981 world premiere at Off-Broadway's Negro Ensemble Company alongside Denzel Washington and Samuel L. Jackson. Washington and Grier reprised their performances in the 1984 film adaptation.
Previews will start December 27 at the American Airlines Theatre ahead of an official opening January 21. Among the design team are set designer Derek McLane, costume designer Dede Ayite, lighting designer Allen Lee Hughes, and sound designer Dan Moses Schreier.
Additional casting for both Broadway bows will be announced at a later date.
