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Welcome to Last Week on Broadway for Monday, January 5, 2026. I'm Broadway Radio's Matt Tiamineni. As we told you back in mid December, even though today on Broadway is no more, I will be bringing you much of the same information in various forms and fashions here in the Broadway Radio feeds, both on Patreon and in the regular feed. We're going to start weekly on Mondays or Sunday nights in Patreon with a look back at the theater news from the previous week. Obviously with this episode we are going back even further since we haven't had an episode since mid December. We're going to run through all of the news that came out over the holidays and I will also give you what is going to be coming up over the next week in New York theater as well as in other places around the country and the world. Then throughout the course of the week we will also bring you the weekly Broadway grosses. I will do review recap episodes, one of which we will have coming up later this week. I will also drop individual review episodes for every show that I see from a press perspective, not necessarily everything that I purchase tickets to, but anything I go to in New York City for sure, whether I buy a ticket or not, the major national tours, shows at regional theaters, those types of things. I will do individual review episodes. So gone are the days of travelog episodes for New York. I will do an individual 5ish minute review episode for every show and then obviously when there is breaking news we will will drop in with special Today on Broadway episodes as well. We are also working towards having a some sort of a return of this Week in Theater, which is a regional theater episode show where we would talk about different shows around the country, national tours. We're going to kind of focus on individual regions for every episode. As of now, we're thinking that'll be a once a month thing. But we will certainly have everything in the feeds here both in Patreon and in the regular feed, as well as something like a Pop, which Jen and I recorded an episode over this weekend that'll be coming out soon. All of Jan Simpson stuff, maybe some other things from other regular contributors including Grace Aki, jennifessa, Fox and more. So thank you for sticking along with us. I hope you had a wonderful holidays and are going to have a fantastic new year. But let's dive in to the news and let's start with a show that we had teased before our holiday break and that is the fact that Titanic, which ran off Broadway in multiple Locations for a number of years, has confirmed that it is going to set up shop for a 16 week engagement on Broadway at the St. James Theater beginning performances on March 26th. It is currently scheduled to play through July 12th. I'm imagining they are hoping for an oh Mary kind of run this little sassy off Broadway show that felt so off Broadway that it didn't even make sense to move to Broadway. And yet it defied the odds and found an audience. I'm not 100% sure if that's going to happen for Titanic for a number of reasons, but we will get into that. The show's co creator, Marla Mandel, will return to the role of Celine Dion. She was a Lortel Award winner for that part. Interestingly enough, the other one of the other co writers, Constantine Rossulli, who starred as Jack, has not been announced to be a part of the cast and from what I understand will not be a part of the cast. And there have been some pretty interesting rumors about who is going to be joining the production and I think that's probably a really good thing because Titanic ran for like over three years off Broadway. I feel like a lot of the people in and around New York City who wanted to see this show have seen this show. So. And it honestly, it didn't really continue to pull super well off Broadway, the Daryl Roth Theater in its later months and year. So if they are going to try to set up a shop or try to set up shop at the St. James Theater, which is a pretty big house at 1700 seats, they're going to have to draw more people in. And the best way to do that is with stars. And from what I understand, at least depending on what your definition of stars are, there are going to be a number of people with familiar names both to Broadway and larger Hollywood audiences, including people who have been on Broadway before and are returning after varying lengths of absences. Someone who has been on Broadway fairly regularly after ending one of the most successful, successful sitcoms of all time. So we'll see if any of those rumors end up being true. But I will say if some of these casting rumors on the street are true, that would be a big old bazinga to the Broadway community. It would also be pitch perfect in terms of finding people to bring Glee to audiences as well. So we'll see if any of those things are true. I don't know. I've heard some more than others. Some of them seem ridiculous, some of them seem possible, but we will have to find out over the next coming weeks. But again, performances begin at the end of March. So you would imagine rehearsals will start at the end of February. So there's really only about 5, 6 weeks until rehearsals start. So they're going to want to start trying to sell tickets to, you know, create buzz and create in advance. So the stars, at least the biggest names of them will likely be announced in the coming few weeks here in January. But that was not the only musical that we found out before the holidays that will be coming to Broadway this season. And the other one is the musical adaptation of Beaches. Now this is a show that has had multiple out of town tryouts. It started first in Chicago starring Shoshana Bean and Whitney basher. Then in 2024 it played at the theater Calgary in Alberta where it starred Jessica Vosk and Kelly Barrett. And those two stars are going to be the ones that will bring it to Broadway one day after Titanique begins its performances. Beaches will begin performances on Friday, March 27th at the Majestic Theater. It is currently scheduled to run through September 6, after which a tour has been planned which is fairly interesting. It is being co directed by Lonnie Price and Matt Cohort and the Broadway premiere will feature, as I said, Vosk playing the Bette Midler role of Cece from the original movie and Kelly Barrett playing Bertie which is the character from the book. It was Hillary in the movie which was played by Barbara Hershey. It is based on a best selling novel by Iris Rainier Dart and it will feature lyrics and a book by Dart. Tom Thomas will also co write the book and it features a score score by, I mean the legendary Mike Stoler, he of Lieber and Stoler fame. If you think of all of the songs in Smokey Joe's Cafe, those are Lieber and Stoler songs. So obviously a hit maker. This has had ups and downs. I think they completely threw out the original score and rewrote a new one for the Alberta, Canada tryout. So it's very, very different show than it was in Chicago with obviously some things kept from the original. The song Wind Beneath My Wings came from that movie that is in the show. Now with those announcements of both Titanique and Beaches, that means that Broadway is essentially full for the 2026 spring season save one theater and that is the James Earl Jones where Liberation has extended to play through February 1st. Unless that show just does incredibly well post New Year's, which it hasn't really been doing that well pre New Year's, the chances are that that will continue to stick to its closing date on February 1st. And there will be another show starring a very loquacious two time Oscar winner that previously played in London, setting up shop there. And that will complete the season, of course, unless something closes unexpectedly. And at this point I don't think that is likely to happen. So that means every theater on Broadway will have a show in the spring at some point. Sort. Hopefully things don't close before something else can come in. But there is something scheduled for every theater. And then we have to start thinking about what happens in the fall. You know, we're getting to the point now where as we start getting closer and closer to the spring season, we will start hearing about things happening in the fall, whether those are subscription houses, some of them announced in the spring, some of them announced in the summer. Then we have all of these new shows, lots of them closing in June, some in July, some going into August and September. But we will see what happens with a lot of these shows. Certainly some pretty wild rumors coming in here about what might be happening next season 2026, 2027. But we will obviously keep you updated on all of that. All right, let's run through some show and casting news because we have gotten quite a bit over the past three weeks that we have been off second stage announced some of the cast members for the upcoming Broadway premiere of the show Becky Shaw, which will begin performances at the Helen Hayes Theater on March 18. This of course is the play written by Gina Gianfredo, which originally premiered off Broadway in 2009. It is directed here by Trip Coleman and it will feature Alden Ironreich, who most recently was seen in Weapons, a fairly big rising movie star Patrick Ball, who was most recently seen on HBO Max's hit show the Pit, which begins its second season here in just a few days. And then three time Tony nominee Linda Amand. This one is going to begin performances on March 18th and is currently scheduled to open on April 6th. It was a Pulitzer Prize finalist back in 2009, but this is going to be the Broadway debut. There are two other characters that have not been announced quite yet, but it is a show that has a lot of excitement from people who remember it from 2009. So excited to see what that looks like. Sticking with Broadway casting, as we've talked about, the folks over at OH Mary are doing incredible work with replacement casting and we now know who is going to take over as Mary's teacher beginning in early February, February 3rd to be exact. And currently scheduled to play through April 21st. And that will be the star of the Marvel Cinematic Universe's Shang Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings, as well as King Kim's convenience in the new Peacock show, the Copenhagen Test. This, of course, is the one and only Simu Leo, who will be making his Broadway debut with this show. He is going to be joining a lot of the current cast members. He is going to be joining John Andrew Morrison as Mary's husband, Jen Harris as Mary's chaperone and Tony Mockt as Mary's husband's assistant, who have all extended their runs through April 26th. 6th, John Cameron Mitchell will be stepping into the role of Mary Todd Lincoln along with Simu on February 3. So again knocking it out of the park in terms of casting over there at oh Mary, moving off Broadway with another Hollywood favorite who is going to be coming to the stage in New York City. And this one is happening over at New World Stages with the production of Heathers. Now, things have been a little bit interesting there because the original mythic bitch herself, Heather Chandler, played by Mackenzie Kurtz. Mackenzie kind of like exited the show without any fanfare whatsoever in December where it was just kind of announced like, hey, this is her last performance. It's tonight. And Jody Steele, who had come in when Mackenzie was on an absence and had done the role in London, she took over the role at that point. But Starting on Monday, January 26, will be a young star that maybe, if you don't know, perhaps your children do. And that is Peyton List, who came to fame starring alongside the great Kevin Chamberlain in the Disney Channel show Jesse. She was, I think, the oldest child maybe in the family of kids that were nannied by the show's star, Debbie Ryan. She went on to star in Cobra Kai on Netflix and then as the lead in the Paramount plus series School Spirits. She is going to be taking over the role of Heather Chandler off Broadway. She's going to be starring alongside Casey Likes, Kuhu Verma, who took over the role of Veronica Sawyer over the break, Jakira Davis, Elizabeth Teeter and Kerry Butler and more. The show is currently scheduled to play through May 24th. It has been extended a couple of times. Maybe Peyton's stardom and appeal to the Disney Channel crowd will help extend it even further. We've talked quite a bit about this rise of Disney Channel stars, whether it is with somebody like Morgan Dudley from the Descendants franchise in Hadestown, Milo Manheim from the Zombies franchise in not only little trope of horrors off Broadway, but Jesus Christ Superstar at the Hollywood Bowl. Meg Donnelly, also from Zombies currently seen in Moulin Rouge. Then you've got like the Jordan Fishers and Dove Cameron who's done a show off Broadway. Like there's a lot of Disney Channel kids who are now growing up into young adult actors who are finding their ways to New York stages. And I would not be surprised if this is something that continues to, continues to happen and we start to see more of them because they do have a following. Ryan McCarten even obviously done a lot on Broadway. So expect to continue to see a lot of folks like this, especially if they end up doing well, like a lot of the people from what I understand have done with Milo and Meg and obviously Jordan Fisher and and some of these other folks. So looking forward to hearing all about Peyton's trip to Westerburg High School starting later this month. Now this is not on Broadway or even in New York, but it does have to do with a beloved Broadway veteran who has gone on to be an absolute icon in Hollywood and that is Kristen Bell. She is going to lead a three day public presentation of a new musical comedy called Three Months later that is going to happen in February. From February 19th through February 21st. It's going to happen in LA at the historic Jim Henson Studios. Then it will have a final invite only show for industry members. The plan is to build a full commercial stage run of this show and then adapt it into a film. Which is kind of crazy to me, but when people say that you're like okay, whatever. But Elizabeth Banks's production studio is already on board to help with the production of this. The musical follows the crash landing of a flight in the middle of nowhere with 100 passengers gradually learning how to acquire food, water and shelter to survive. However, morale is low which causes Maggie, which is Christian Bell's character, to propose putting on a full production of Romeo and Juliet. Alongside Kristen Bell in these presentations will be the icon of Hollywood, Lea Thompson as well. So this sounds like a lot of fun getting Kristen Bell back in a stage musical. Obviously she has done all of the Frozen films which are musicals, but getting her back in onto a Broadway stage after playing Becky Thatcher in one of the Tom Sawyer shows, I can't remember which one it was, Tom Sawyer or Finn or Huck or whatever. But getting her back to Broadway at some point would be really, really awesome. All right, let's wrap up some of the show and casting stuff. And it was announced that the great two time Tony Award nominee Kate Baldwin has extended her run playing Roxie Hart in Chicago on Broadway. She was originally going to leave this coming Sunday, January 11th, but she is going to stick with it until Whitney Levitt takes over the role on February 2nd. So Kate Baldwin will be there until February 1st and then something that is very important to me, which we'll talk about here in just a second. But starting on Tuesday, the one and only pop icon Joey Fatone will return to A and Juliet, but not on Broadway. He's going to be doing a short limited engagement with the national tour for a limited engagement, I think just in his hometown of Orlando, Florida from January 6th through the 11th. We're going to talk about that here in just a second. So that is very cool. And he of course did the role on Broadway previously and he has tons of other things on his Broadway resume as well, including playing Mark and Rental, doing Seymour and Little Shop of Horrors on Broadway. So lots of good stuff from Joey Fatone and looking forward to seeing him on Stage at the Dr. Phillips center for the Performing Arts not once but twice this coming week. And that of course does lead me into this week's theatrical schedule, as I said. And Juliet starring Joey Fatone will be at the Dr. Phillips center from January 6th through the 11th. If you want to see Joey Fatone sing these incredible Max Martin songs in, including some from his boy band, some from rival boy bands, I have a link in the show notes if you want to check that out. Also happening this week on Broadway. I referenced it earlier in the episode, but we do have our next Broadway opening. And that of course is Bug by Tracy Letts, directed by David Cromer. It is the Broadway premiere for this show that has been around for I think close to two decades. It stars Tracy Letts wife, the indomitable cat, Harry Coon, along with Namir Smallwood, Randall Arnie, Jennifer Engerstrom and Steve Key. The show is playing at the same O.J. friedman Theater and is currently scheduled to run through February 8th. That's a real short turnaround from December 16th, first preview, January 8th, opening. So three weeks and then just one month before closing. I imagine there's probably a little bit of room for an extension there if the reviews are good. Although Bug is a tough show, like it's, it's a, it's one that could be pretty divisive I would imagine. But the Ballisters, which is the next MTC show that's going to go into that space, doesn't begin performances until March 31st. So really they have probably a three week window and they could extend and then still have plenty of time to load out bug and load in the balusters. So if things go well, I could certainly see that getting an extension. Also happening on Thursday over at the Mandelane Theater from Audible will be the new comedy written and directed by Erica Schmidt called the Disappear. The show stars Hamish Linkletter, Miriam Silverman, Dylan Baker, Madeline brewer, Kelvin Harrison Jr. And Anna Meriden. It focuses on a power couple, Benjamin Braxton, who is Hamish Linkletter, and Meera Blair, played by Miriam Sullivan, as they see their picture perfect life go gloriously off script, taking their friends, flings and daughter along for the ride. The show is currently scheduled to play just through February 15th and of course with all Audible things, it'll be recorded for future audio streaming down the road on the Audible platform. Then on Friday we have the first Off Broadway performance for the new play Data or Data, I don't know which one. It could go either way, I suppose, depending on how you like to pronounce that word. It is going to play over at the Lucille Lortel Theater. It is a new play by Matthew Libby and it pulls back the curtain on Silicon Valley's darkest ambitions. It is directed by the always wonderful Tyne Raffaelli and is currently scheduled to play through March 29. And then wrapping up its Off Broadway run at The Duke on 42nd street is the play Messy White Gaze on Sunday, January 11th. I of course will have links to to all of these shows in the show notes if you want to check them out over this next week. All right everybody, that's all that we have for you today. Thank you so much for listening and sticking with us throughout the holidays. We are back with a new version of Broadway Radio, but hopefully getting you all the information that you need. Thank you so much for listening. We will talk to you soon and we'll see you at the theater.