Rialto Chatter: Harriet Harris, Will Swenson, and Kathy Fitzgerald to Lead the Cast of THE ROYAL FAMILY OF BROADWAY?

According to a casting notice, the world premiere of The Royal Family of Broadway at Barrington Stage Company will be lead by Harriet Harris as Fanny, Will Swenson as Tony, and Kathy Fitzgerald as Kitty. The notice also listed Arnie Burton as Bert, Chip Zien as Oscar, Hayley Podschun as Gwen, AJ Shively as Perry, and Alan H. Green as Gil. The role of Julie has not yet been cast.

From the creators of the Tony-Award winning The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee and creative team behind the Tony-nominated 2014 Broadway revival of On The Town comes the World Premiere of The Royal Family of Broadway, a masterful musical comedy love letter to the Great White Way. For the Cavendishes the show must go on! Set in the 1920's and loosely based on the legendary Barrymore family, it centers on three generations of actors: an aging imperious grande dame, a Broadway star looking for love, a self-centered boozing leading man who has fled to Hollywood, and a promising ingénue - each having to make pivotal choices in their lives.

With a book by Tony Award winner Rachel Sheinkin (The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee), music and lyrics by Tony Award winner William Finn (The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, Falsettos, Artistic Producer of BSC's Musical Theatre Lab), choreography by Tony Award nominee and Emmy Award winner Joshua Bergasse (On The Town, "So You Think You Can Dance") and direction by Tony Award winner John Rando (On The Town, Urinetown), The Royal Family of Broadway will begin previews on June 7, 2018 on the Boyd-Quinson Mainstage. Opening is set for June 13, 2018 and will run through June 30, 2018.

Barrington Stage Company is a professional award-winning Equity regional theatre located in the heart of the Berkshires, in Pittsfield, MA. It was co-founded in 1995 by Artistic Director JuliAnne Boyd and has a three-fold mission: to present top-notch, compelling work; to develop new plays and musicals; and to find fresh, bold ways of bringing new audiences into the theatre-especially young people. Barrington Stage garnered national attention in 2004 when it premiered William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin's musical hit The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee which later transferred to Broadway, where it won two Tony Awards. In 2009, Mark St. Germain's Freud's Last Session ran more than ten weeks on Stage 2 and later moved Off-Broadway and played for two years. St. Germain's Becoming Dr. Ruth (which premiered at BSC as Dr. Ruth, All the Way in 2012) played Off-Broadway at the Westside Theatre in fall 2013. BSC's all-time record-breaking musical, On the Town was originally produced at BSC in 2013. In 2014, it opened on Broadway with BSC as a co-producer, where it was nominated for four Tony Awards including Best Musical Revival. In 2016, Barrington Stage swept the? first Annual Berkshire Theatre Awards by winning 20 out of the 25 awards. In 2016, BSC produced three World Premieres; Presto Change-O, Broadway BounTy Hunter, and American Son, which won the Laurents/Hatcher Award for Best New Play. In 2017, BSC won the Best of the Berkshires Reader's Choice for Best Live Theatre.