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    Lea Michele Returns to Broadway in ‘Chess’

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    The “Glee” star will join Aaron Tveit and Nicholas Christopher next fall in a Broadway revival of an Abba-adjacent Cold War musical.The 1980s musical “Chess,” about a love triangle set in the geopolitically charged world of top-level chess tournaments at the height of the Cold War, will be revived on Broadway for the first time this fall, with Lea Michele playing one of the three starring roles.Michele was last on Broadway in 2023 in “Funny Girl,” whose fortunes she revived after stepping in as a replacement when the initial lead wasn’t working out. Best known for portraying an ambitious musical theater actress on the television series “Glee,” Michele will star in “Chess” alongside Aaron Tveit (a Tony winner for “Moulin Rouge! The Musical”) and Nicholas Christopher (a “Hamilton” alumnus who recently thrilled critics in an Encores! production of “Jelly’s Last Jam”).The show is the brainchild and passion project of Tim Rice, the Tony-winning lyricist of “Evita” and “Aida.” Rice collaborated with Benny Andersson and Bjorn Ulvaeus of Abba on the music and lyrics.The revival was announced Wednesday, but the announcement did not include specific dates or the exact theater — only that it would be staged in the fall at a theater operated by the Shubert Organization. The lead producers will be Tom Hulce, Robert Ahrens and the Shubert Organization.“Chess,” set primarily in Bangkok and Budapest, tells a fictional story about two grandmasters, one American (Tveit) and one Soviet (Christopher), facing off at a chess tournament, joined by a woman (Michele) whom both of them, at various points, love.The musical, first staged in London in 1986 and then heavily revised for a Broadway production in 1988, has an ardent fan base, but the Broadway production was a flop, and the show has been reworked for subsequent stagings around the world.This fall’s production features another new book, by the screenwriter Danny Strong. The show will be directed by Michael Mayer, who directed Michele both in her breakout Broadway role, in “Spring Awakening,” and in “Funny Girl.”Mayer and Strong, working with Rice, have been rethinking “Chess” for some time — they collaborated on a 2018 concert presentation of the musical at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts in Washington. More

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      Avett Brothers Musical ‘Swept Away’ to Close on Broadway After Short Run

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      The new musical, about a shipwreck and its aftermath, opened Nov. 19 at the Longacre Theater.“Swept Away,” a darkly elegiac musical featuring the songs of the Avett Brothers, will end its Broadway run Dec. 15, less than a month after opening.The musical, about a 19th-century shipwreck and its aftermath, explores the lengths to which human beings will go in order to survive. Although set in fictional circumstances, it is based on a real 19th-century tragedy that led to an important legal case in Britain.“Swept Away” began previews Oct. 29 and opened Nov. 19 at the Longacre Theater. At the time of its closing it will have played 20 previews and 32 regular performances.The show cost up to $14.5 million to capitalize, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, and that money has not been recouped. The weekly grosses were consistently well below what it cost to run, which is unsustainable.“Swept Away” is the second new musical of this season to close shortly after opening, following “Tammy Faye,” at a time when new musicals face an ever-more-challenging path on Broadway.The Avett Brothers have a devoted fan base, and “Swept Away” was praised by the New York Times’s chief theater critic, Jesse Green, who described it as “really about the gravest decisions humans can make, the depths of souls that are darker than the sea’s.”But other reviews were mixed, and the musical, like the actual history that inspired it, includes cannibalism, which, although not featured prominently in marketing materials or press coverage, may have been a turnoff for some potential ticket buyers. Broadway is also packed with shows, many of which feature more familiar titles or performers, and “Swept Away” was unable to break through in that crowded marketplace.Many of the show’s songs were featured on the Avett Brothers album “Mignonette,” and a cast recording is scheduled to be released in February. John Logan, the Tony-winning author of “Red,” wrote the musical’s book, and it was directed by Michael Mayer, a Tony winner for “Spring Awakening.”The 90-minute show centers on four men stranded on a lifeboat — the only survivors of the shipwreck. They are played by John Gallagher Jr., a Tony winner for “Spring Awakening,” as well as Stark Sands (“Kinky Boots”), Adrian Blake Enscoe and Wayne Duvall.The lead producers of “Swept Away” are Matthew Masten, Sean Hudock and Madison Wells Live (founded by Gigi Pritzker). Before arriving on Broadway, the musical had runs at Berkeley Repertory Theater in California in 2022 and at Arena Stage in Washington in late 2023 and early 2024. More

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      Avett Brothers Musical, ‘Swept Away,’ to Open on Broadway This Fall

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      The show, inspired by a 19th-century shipwreck, has had previous runs in Berkeley, Calif., and Washington.“Swept Away,” a new musical featuring songs by the Americana band the Avett Brothers, is planning to open on Broadway this fall, following productions in California and Washington.The musical is inspired by a once-famous shipwreck: In 1884, a British yacht called the Mignonette was wrecked at sea, and the four-man crew’s desperate efforts to survive, which included cannibalism, led to a protracted and influential legal battle. The details of the ordeal have been changed for “Swept Away,” which is set in 1888 on a whaling ship off the coast of New Bedford, Mass.Much of the musical’s score is drawn from “Mignonette,” a 2004 Avett Brothers album inspired by the shipwreck. But the score also includes songs from four other Avett Brothers albums and an original song the band wrote for the stage show.The band announced that the musical would be coming to Broadway during a concert on Friday night at Forest Hills Stadium in Queens. Some of the actors who have performed in previous iterations of the show joined them onstage.The musical features a book by John Logan, who won a Tony Award for writing “Red.” The director is Michael Mayer, who won a Tony for directing “Spring Awakening.”The show has had two previous productions, in 2022 at Berkeley Repertory Theater in California, and last winter at Arena Stage in Washington. Thomas Floyd, a critic for The Washington Post, called it “transfixing” and said “this morality tale launches with toe-tapping propulsion before anchoring for an intimate elegy on grief and guilt.”A spokesman said the musical would open this fall at a Shubert theater, but said the production was not ready to confirm the specific timing or location. The principal actors from the previous productions — John Gallagher Jr., Stark Sands, Adrian Blake Enscoe and Wayne Duvall — joined the Avett Brothers onstage Friday night, and were introduced as “the cast of the soon-to-be-officially Broadway show.”The Broadway run will be produced by Matthew Masten, Sean Hudock, and Madison Wells Live (founded by Gigi Pritzker, a billionaire film producer). More