Breaking News: Casting Announced for MY FAIR LADY at Lincoln Center - Ambrose, Hadden-Paton, Butz & Rigg to Star

Lincoln Center Theater (under the direction of André Bishop) has announced that Lauren Ambrose will be Eliza Doolittle, Harry Hadden-Paton will be Henry Higgins, Norbert Leo Butz will be Alfred P. Doolittle, and Diana Rigg will be Mrs. Higgins in its upcoming production of Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady, directed by Bartlett Sher.

Produced in association with Nederlander Presentations Inc., the classic musical, with book and lyrics by Alan Jay Lerner and music by Frederick Loewe, will feature choreography by Christopher Gattelli and music direction by Ted Sperling, and will begin previews Thursday, March 15 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater (150 West 65 Street). Opening night is Thursday, April 19.

Adapted from George Bernard Shaw's play and Gabriel Pascal's motion picture Pygmalion, My Fair Lady premiered on Broadway on March 15, 1956. The legendary original production won 6 Tony Awards including Best Musical and ran for 2,717 performances making it, at the time, the longest-running musical in Broadway history.

Boasting a score that contains such now-classic songs as "I Could Have Danced All Night," "Get Me to the Church on Time," "Wouldn't It Be Loverly," "On the Street Where You Live," "The Rain in Spain," and "I've Grown Accustomed to Her Face," My Fair Lady was hailed by The New York Times as "one of the best musicals of the century," by the Christian Science Monitor as "a work of theatre magic," and by the NY Herald Tribune as "a miraculous musical."

Lincoln Center Theater's production of Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady will have sets by Michael Yeargan, costumes by Catherine Zuber, lighting by Donald Holder, and sound by Marc Salzberg. Additional casting and creative credits will be announced at a later date. Harry Hadden-Paton and Diana Rigg are appearing with the support of Actors' Equity Association.

Support for LCT's production of Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady is generously provided by The Blanche and Irving Laurie Foundation.

Tickets to Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady, priced from $87 to $177, will be available beginning Sunday, October 29 at the Lincoln Center Theater box office, at telecharge.com, or by visiting www.MyFairLadyBway.com. A limited number of tickets priced at $32 are available at every performance through LincTix, LCT's program for 21 to 35 year olds. For information and to enroll, visit LincTix.org.

Lauren Ambrose (Eliza Doolittle) LCT: Awake and Sing!. Broadway: Exit the King. Off-Broadway: Juliet inRomeo and Juliet and Ophelia in Hamlet, both at The Public Theater's Shakespeare in the Park. A two-time Emmy Award nominee for her performance in the HBO series "Six Feet Under," her other film and television credits includeWhere the Wild Things Are, directed by Spike Jonze, Wanderlust, Sleepwalk with Me, Starting Out in the Evening, I'm Coming Over, The River, "Torchwood," "Law & Order: SVU," and "The X-Files."

Harry Hadden-Paton (Henry Higgins) will be making his New York stage debut in Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady. His UK theater credits include in the West End: The Importance of Being Earnest (Ian Charleson Award nomination), Flare Path, and The Pride. Off-West End: She Stoops to Conquer (The Royal National Theatre), Posh(The Royal Court), The Changeling (The Young Vic), and The Prince of Homburg (The Donmar Warehouse). Known to U.S. television audiences for his portrayals of Bertie Pelham on "Downton Abbey" and Martin Charteris on "The Crown," his other TV credits include "Versailles," "Wallander,"and "Grantchester." Film: The Little Stranger, About Time, The Hollow Crown, The Deep Blue Sea, In the Loop, and La Vie en Rose.

Norbert Leo Butz (Alfred P. Doolittle) LCT: Thou Shalt Not (Tony Award nomination). Broadway: Big Fish, Dead Accounts, Catch Me If You Can (Tony Award), Enron, Speed-the-Plow, Is He Dead?, Dirty Rotten Scoundrels(Tony Award), Wicked, Rent. Off-Broadway: The Whirligig, How I Learned to Drive, Fifty Words, Buicks (Drama Desk nomination), Carousel (Carnegie Hall), The Last Five Years (Drama Desk nomination), Juno and the Paycock. Film: Better Living Through Chemistry, The English Teacher, Disconnect, Greetings from Tim Buckley, Higher Ground, Fair Game. TV: "Mercy Street," "Bloodline," "Blue Bloods," "The Good Wife," "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation," "Law & Order: Criminal Intent," "Law & Order: SVU."

RIGG (Mrs. Higgins) Broadway: Medea (Tony Award), The Misanthrope (Tony and Drama Desk nominations), Abelard and Heloise (Tony nomination). Off-Broadway: Britannicus and Phaedra (BAM). National tour: Colette, King Lear. Her many London theater credits include West End: Pygmalion (Mrs. Higgins, 2011/Eliza Doolittle, 1974), Honour, Suddenly, Last Summer, Follies, Heartbreak House, Night and Day, Macbeth, Abelard and Heloise; National Theatre: Humble Boy, Mother Courage and her Children, The Misanthrope, Jumpers; Almeida Theatre: Britannicus, Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf (also West End), Medea (also West End), Phaedra; RSC: Twelfth Night, King Lear. Film: Breathe, The Honourable Rebel, The Painted Veil, Heidi, Parting Shots, A Good Man in Africa, Snow White, Evil Under the Sun, The Great Muppet Caper, A Little Night Music, Theatre of Blood, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, The Assassination Bureau, A Midsummer Night's Dream. Extensive TV credits include PBS Masterpiece's "Victoria" (currently as Duchess of Buccleuch), "Game of Thrones" (3 Emmy nominations), "Extras," "Victoria & Albert" (Emmy nomination), "The Mrs. Bradley Mysteries," "Rebecca" (Emmy Award), "Screen Two" (Cable Ace Award), "Mother Love" (BAFTA Award), "Bleak House," "Diana," "The Avengers." She was named a Commander of the British Empire in 1988 and a Dame of the British Empire in 2004.

Alan Jay Lerner (Book and Lyrics) wrote the following plays with Frederick Loewe: Life of the Party, What's Up, The Day Before Spring, Brigadoon, Paint Your Wagon, My Fair Lady, Camelot, Gigi. He also wrote Love Life with Kurt Weill, On a Clear Day You Can See Forever and Carmelina with Burton Lane, Coco with Andre Previn, 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue with Leonard Bernstein, and Dance a Little Closer with Charles Strouse. He wrote the libretto and/or lyrics for the following films: An American in Paris, Gigi, The Little Prince, Royal Wedding, and film versions of his plays. He wrote two books: The Street Where I Live and The Musical Theatre: A Celebration. Mr. Lerner died in 1986.

Frederick Loewe (Music) wrote the scores for some of America's most memorable musicals, including My Fair Lady, Camelot, Brigadoon, Paint Your Wagon, and Gigi. Among his most famous songs with lyricist-partner Alan Jay Lerner are "Almost Like Being in Love," "I Could Have Danced All Night," and "Thank Heaven for Little Girls." A musical prodigy, Loewe was born in Berlin in 1901 and, at 13, was the youngest piano soloist to play with the Berlin Philharmonic. Struggling to find work on Broadway after arriving in the U.S. in 1924, Loewe worked at odd jobs and wrote with several other lyricists until approaching Lerner at New York's Lambs Club in 1942 about collaborating on a show - thus beginning one of Broadway's most extraordinary partnerships. Loewe died in Palm Springs in 1988.

Bartlett Sher (Director) is Resident Director of Lincoln Center Theater, where his productions include J.T. Rogers' Oslo (Tony nomination), Rodgers & Hammerstein's The King and I (Tony nomination), Golden Boy (Tony nomination), Blood & Gifts, Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown, Joe Turner's Come and Gone (Tony nomination), South Pacific (Tony, Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle awards), Awake and Sing! (Tony nomination), and The Light in the Piazza (Tony nomination). He directed the recent Broadway productions of Fiddler on the Roofand The Bridges of Madison County (also Williamstown Theatre Festival), as well as New York productions of Prayer for My Enemy and The Butterfly Collection (Playwrights Horizons); Cymbeline (Callaway Award, co-produced with the RSC); Waste (Best Play Obie Award); and Don Juan and Pericles (Theatre for a New Audience). While Artistic Director of Seattle's Intiman Theatre from 2000 -2009, he directed 20 productions including works by Shakespeare, Chekhov, Ibsen, Shaw, Wilder, Goldoni, and Kushner, among others. Opera: Romeo et Juliet, IL Barbiere di Siviglia,Les Contes d'Hoffmann, Le Comte Ory, L'Elisir d'Amore, Two Boys, Otello (Metropolitan Opera); Faust (Baden Baden); Romeo et Juliette (Salzburg Festival and La Scala); Mourning Becomes Electra (Seattle Opera and New York City Opera), Two Boys (ENO). Upcoming productions include Adam Guettel's new musical Millions.

Lincoln Center Theater, now celebrating its 33rd year, is one of New York's favorite not-for-profit theaters, with productions at Lincoln Center's Vivian Beaumont, Mitzi E. Newhouse and Claire Tow Theaters, and other theaters on and off Broadway, as well as touring productions nationally and around the world, TV and film projects, and original cast recordings. LCT is currently producing Ayad Akhtar's new play JUNK beginning performances October 5 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater, Sarah DeLappe's The Wolves beginning November 1 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater, and the LCT3 production of Zoe Kazan's After the Blast beginning October 7 at the Claire Tow Theater. In addition to Lerner & Loewe's My Fair Lady, upcoming productions include Joshua Harmon'sAdmissions and the LCT3 production of Martyna Majok's queens.

Nederlander Presentations Inc. is a production division of the multinational theatrical entities owned by James L. Nederlander. Prominent for three generations in management and operation of theatres and productions of distinguished entertainment, they have produced innumerable plays, musicals, operas, ballets and concerts. The Nederlanders also own a notable chain of legitimate theatres. Currently in their Broadway venues are Wicked, Disney'sThe Lion King, Hamilton, Waitress, Cats, War Paint, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and Spongebob Squarepants.