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Tony winner Kenny Leon will direct a new Broadway production of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town in the fall of 2024, the first revival of the classic play since the 2002 production that starred Paul Newman as the stage manager.
The production dates, cast, and venue will be announced at a later date.
Leon’s many Broadway directing credits include Ohio State Murders, Topdog/Underdog, A Soldier’s Play, American Son and the current Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch starring Leslie Odom Jr. at The Music Box Theatre. He won the 2014 Tony for Best Direction for A Raisin in the Sun starring Denzel Washington, Sophie Okonedo, LaTanya Richardson Jackson and Anika Noni Rose.
“Thornton Wilder’s Our Town in my mind stands at the top of the Mount Rushmore of great American Theatre,” said Leon in a statement. “I feel blessed and fortunate to have gained the trust of The Wilder estate to present this classic to another generation of theatre lovers. It’s long been a burning desire to collaborate on a Broadway production of such magnitude that speaks so beautifully and intimately to all people about our shared time on the planet.”
Tappan Wilder, the playwright’s nephew and literary executor speaking for the Wilder family, said, “The Wilders are thrilled beyond measure that the distinguished director Kenny Leon has agreed to direct Our Town on Broadway. The stars are truly aligned for Grover’s Corner’s the play about everywhere.”
The design team for the revival will include scenic design by Beowulf Boritt (New York, New York), costume design by Dede Ayite (Jaja’s African Hair Braiding; Topdog/Underdog), lighting design by Allen Lee Hughes (Topdog/Underdog; A Soldier’s Play), sound design by Justin Ellington (Ohio State Murders; for colored girls…) and the dialect coach will be Kate Wilson (The Shark is Broken, The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window).
Our Town, set in the mythical village of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, originally opened on Broadway in 1938 and won the Pulitzer Prize. The play explores the relationship between two young Grover’s Corners neighbors, George Gibbs and Emily Webb, whose childhood friendship blossoms into romance, and then culminates in marriage. When Emily loses her life in childbirth, the circle of life – growing up, adulthood, and death – is portrayed in each of the three acts.
Subsequent Broadway productions of the play were staged in 1944, 1969, 1988 and, in the revival starring Newman and directed by James Naughton, 2002.
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