Once upon a December may happen in December, and more importantly, on Broadway. Everyone’s favorite czarina with amnesia, Anastasia, looks to be headed for New York, which is obvious cause for a lot of vodka and plenty of celebration.
Following the success of the Broadway adaptations of A Little Mermaid and Beauty and the Beast, Anastasia is the latest animated princess to be hightailing off the big screen and onto the big stage. The classic story follows a young woman with no memory of her past in 1920s Paris, who seeks an identity and a reunion with a surprising family. On Friday, Stage Entertainment USA and Tom Kirdahy announced that the beloved musical would be produced during the 2016-2017 season, though the Shubert theater that will have the honor of housing the production has yet to be announced.
The show already has an all-star team in the form of book writer Terrence McNally, composer Stephen Flaherty, and lyricist Lynn Ahren. Flaherty and Ahren won Tony Awards for their compositions in Ragtime back in 1998, and they may be looking to reprise the honor decades later.
While Anastasia is destined for audiences of New York, it will be making its world premiere next month at Hartford Stage in Connecticut. Directed by 2014 Tony Award winner Darko Tresnjak (honored for his work in A Gentleman’s Guide to Love & Murder), the musical’s choreography will come from the mind of Peggy Hickey. The pre-Broadway shows will run from May 12 to June 19.
The show will feature many audience favorites from Fox Animation Studios’ 1997 film, including the Oscar-nominated song Journey to the Past. And while there’s a new score in play, it seems that all the things we loved about the old Anastasia will be present in this new version as well. There’s no word yet as to who the cast of the New York performance will be (nor dates, for that matter), but you may want to start getting ready to get in line.