A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE Returns To Broadway Starring Blair Underwood in 2012; Emily Mann Directs

The Hollywood Reporter has reveals today that A Streetcar Named Desire will get a Broadway revival in the spring of 2012, directed by Emily Mann and starring The Event's Blair Underwood as Stanley Kowalski. The production will be presented on Broadway by Front Row Productions. This will be the nineth revival of the famous Tennessee Williams play, the most recent being in 2005 starring the late Natasha Richardson, Amy Ryan and John C. Reilly.

For Streetcar, Tennessee Williams received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1948. The play first opened on Broadway on December 3, 1947, and closed on December 17, 1949, in the Ethel Barrymore Theatre. The Broadway production was directed by Elia Kazan and starred Marlon Brando, Jessica Tandy, Kim Hunter, and Karl Malden. The London production opened in 1949 with Bonar Colleano, Vivien Leigh, and Renee Asherson and was directed by Laurence Olivier.

Underwood first caught the attention of the entertainment industry as attorney Jonathan Rollins on the NBC legal drama L.A. Law, a role he played for seven years. In theater, he has participated in the 2004 workshop of his one-man show IM4: From the Mountaintop to Hip Hop, which Underwood conceived and was written by his brother. Other credits include Purlie with Anika Noni Rose, Measure for Measure, El Negro en Peru, The Game of Love and Love Letters with Alfre Woodard.

He has receieved severAl Golden Globe Award nominations for In Treatment and LA Law, three NAACP Image Awards and 1 Grammy Award. In recent years, he has appeared on The New Adventures of Old Christine, Dirty Sexy Money, Sex and the City and NBC's The Event.