“The Great Gatsby,” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1925 novel of lurid glamor and dashed dreams, is coming to Broadway as a musical this spring.
The show, the latest in a long series of adaptations of this widely read story, had a pre-Broadway run last fall at the Paper Mill Playhouse in Millburn, New Jersey, where it received mixed reviews. (As it happens, the book also received mixed reviews and is now widely considered a great classic of American literature.)
The lavish production will join a spring Broadway season packed with new musicals at a time when many industry leaders are concerned that there don't appear to be enough sponsors to keep most shows afloat.
This new “Gatsby” musical is backed by Chunsoo Shin, a Korean producer eager for a hit on Broadway after a series of failed projects here. He was recently part of the production team for “Once Upon a One More Time,” the short-lived show featuring songs by Britney Spears; His previous projects included a stage adaptation of “Doctor Zhivago” and a Tupac Shakur musical, “Holler if Ya Hear Me.”
“The Great Gatsby” musical includes songs by Nathan Tysen and Jason Howland, who collaborated on the 2022 musical “Paradise Square,” and a book by playwright Kait Kerrigan (“The Mad Ones”). (Tysen and Kerrigan are married.) The director is Marc Bruni, whose previous Broadway run, “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical,” which premiered in 2014, was a huge hit.
The musical will star two Broadway fan favorites. Jeremy Jordan, a Tony nominee for “Newsies,” will play the nouveau riche's main character, Jay Gatsby, while Eva Noblezada, a two-time Tony nominee for “Miss Saigon” and “Hadestown,” will play Daisy Buchanan, the young woman with a lot of money whom Gatsby has desired for a long time.
“The Great Gatsby” is scheduled to begin previews March 29 and open April 25 at the Broadway Theater, one of Broadway's largest houses.
The novel has been explored in other media many times, including a dazzling 2013 Hollywood film directed by Baz Luhrmann and starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Carey Mulligan. A play of “The Great Gatsby” was performed on Broadway in 1926, a year after the novel was published; Off-Broadway there was a highly acclaimed seven-hour version, called “Gatz,” developed by Elevator Repair Service and presented at the Public Theater in 2010.
The novel entered the public domain in 2021, opening the door to numerous adaptations. Most significant, at least for theater audiences, is another musical adaptation in development. It's called “Gatsby” and performances are scheduled to begin in May at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
That production, which also has Broadway aspirations, features a book by Pulitzer-winning playwright Martyna Majok (“Cost of Living”), songs by rock star Florence Welch (of Florence and the Machine) and Thomas Bartlett (also known as Doveman) and directed by Rachel Chavkin (Tony winner for “Hadestown”).
