Kathleen Marshall to Helm Broadway-Bound EVER AFTER Musical; Music by Heisler/Goldrich

Producers Scott Landis and Philip Morgaman have announced that EVER AFTER, a new musical based on the 20th Century Fox Film, will open on Broadway in the 2013-2014 season following a pre-Broadway engagement to be announced. The production will be directed and choreographed by three-time Tony Award winner Kathleen Marshall. EVER AFTER features music by Zina Goldrich and book & lyrics by Marcy Heisler, who recently won the 2012 Kleban Prize for Musical Theatre for most promising musical theatre lyricist. The music director is Mary-Mitchell Campbell.

EVER AFTER tells the story of Danielle de Barbarac, the daughter of a Nobleman in 16th Century France, who embarks on a series of adventures, standing up to her scheming stepmother, befriending Leonardo DaVinci and winning the love of the crown prince of France. This new musical sets the record straight on the fable of Cinderella, showing how a strong-willed, independent girl can make her dreams come true without the help of fairy godmothers, talking mice, or magic pumpkins.

Casting, dates and other creative team will be announced at a later date.

KATHLEEN MARSHALL (Director & Choreographer) is currently represented on Broadway by the Tony-nominated Best Musical Nice Work If You Can Get It, for which she is nominated for Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for direction and choreography, and the Roundabout Theatre Company’s Tony-winning Best Musical Revival Anything Goes, for which she received 2011 Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Awards for choreography and Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics nominations for direction. Also for Roundabout, Kathleen directed and choreographed The Pajama Game and choreographed Follies and 1776. Other Broadway credits include Wonderful Town; Grease; Boeing-Boeing; Little Shop of Horrors; Seussical; Kiss Me, Kate; and Swinging on a Star. Off-Broadway: Two Gentlemen of Verona (New York Shakespeare Festival), Saturday Night (Second Stage), Violet (Playwrights Horizons) and As Thousands Cheer (Drama Dept). City Center Encores!: Bells Are Ringing, Applause, Carnival, Hair and Babes in Arms; Artistic Director for four seasons. For ABC/Disney: “Once Upon a Mattress” and Meredith Willson’s “The Music Man” (Emmy nomination). She has received two Tony Awards, two Drama Desk Awards, two Outer Critics Circle Awards, the Astaire Award, the George Abbott Award, the Richard Rodgers Award and the Pennsylvania Governor’s Award for the Arts. Ms. Marshall is the Vice President of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society and is an Associate Artist of the Roundabout Theatre Company.

ZINA GOLDRICH (Composer), along with lyricist Marcy Heisler, is the 2009 winner of the Fred Ebb Award for Musical Theatre Songwriting. Currently, Ms. Goldrich is composing the score for The Great American Mousical with Heisler and bookwriter Hunter Bell. Julie Andrews will direct the production at Goodspeed Opera House this fall. She has earned a Drama Desk Nomination for Best Music for her score for the DR2 Theatre production of Dear Edwina. She also composed the score for Junie B. Jones, which was twice nominated for the Lucille Lortel Award. Other scores include Allison Under the Stars, Adventures in Love and Snow White, Rose Red (and Fred), which premiered at the Kennedy Center in 2010 and was nominated for a Helen Hayes Award. In addition to being a staff songwriter for Walt Disney Feature Animation, she has composed for various television shows including Wonderpets, Third and Bird, Johnny and the Sprites and Pooh’s Learning Adventures. Ms. Goldrich studied under Jerry Goldsmith in the USC Scoring for Motion Picture and Television program. She is the recipient of ASCAP’s Richard Rodgers New Horizons Award, the Seldes-Kanin Fellowship, a Jonathan Larson grant and numerous scholarships. On Broadway she played keyboards for Avenue Q, Bombay Dreams, Oklahoma and Titanic, where she also conducted.

MARCY HEISLER (Book and Lyrics) is co-recipient, with composer Zina Goldrich, of the 2009 Fred Ebb Award for Musical Theatre Songwriting. She is also the recipient of the 2012 Kleban Prize for Musical Theatre for most promising musical theatre lyricist. She earned a 2009 Drama Desk Nomination for Outstanding Lyrics for Dear Edwina and a Lucille Lortel Award nomination for Junie B. Jones, Other collaborations with Zina Goldrich include The Great American Mousical, written with bookwriter Hunter Bell, directed by Julie Andrews, choreographed by Christopher Gattelli and designed by Tony Walton, premiering in November at Goodspeed Opera House. As a lyricist, Ms. Heisler has contributed songs for many Disney projects, including “Johnny and The Sprites,” “Pooh’s Learning Adventures,” and “The D Show.” She adapted new versions of 101 Dalmatians, Cinderella, Sleeping Beauty and The Jungle Book for Disney Theatricals/MTI's Disney Kids series, and collaborated with composer Michael Picton on songs for Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus 137th Edition. Marcy Heisler has collaborated with composer Zina Goldrich since 1993, and they are past recipients of ASCAP's Richard Rodgers New Horizons Award and the Seldes-Kanin Fellowship.

Photo Credit: Peter James Zielinski