From Encores! to Broadway

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This time, the reader question was: How often do City Center Encores! shows transfer to Broadway?

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This summer, New York City Center Encores! production of Once Upon a Mattress opened at the Hudson Theatre on Broadway. Mattress is the twelfth Encores! production to transfer to the main stem.

The first Encores! show to move to Broadway is the most successful to date. That is Chicago, now the second longest-running Broadway production of all time, and the longest running American musical on Broadway, as the number one spot is occupied by the British- originated Phantom of the Opera.

Mattress stars Sutton Foster in the central role of Winnifred the Woebegone, the unconventional heroine, returning after her triumphant Encores! run in the show. The production is a colorful, jubilant time at the theater that has audience members howling with laughter in their seats; it accomplishes the Encores! goals of bringing older musicals to new audiences and honoring classic elements of musical theatre while spotlighting the stars of today. (How thrilling to see Sutton Foster and the rest of the remarkable cast engaging audiences in 2024 with comedic bits from a 1950s musical that are themselves throwbacks to the days of vaudeville!)

Encores! began at New York City Center in 1994, kicking off its first season with the Pulitzer Prize-winning Fiorello!, the underappreciated Rodgers and Hammerstein experiment Allegro, and the unconventional, psychologically-themed Lady in the Dark. While none of these shows transferred to Broadway, they were an illustrious start for the popular series that brings lesser known established musicals to large audiences with top level casts and creative teams and usually the show’s original orchestrations.

Shows from Encores! were not, after all, expected to transfer to Broadway. They were expected to have short, limited runs featuring casts with script in hand. This expectation was upended when the 1996 Encores! production of Chicago was so acclaimed that it moved to Broadway, where it has been running ever since.

The next Encores! show to move to Broadway was Wonderful Town, which played City Center in 2000 before landing at the Al Hirschfeld from 2003 to 2005. Led by Donna Murphy as smart, idiosyncratic heroine Ruth Sherwood, Wonderful Town, which won the Tony Award for Best Musical in 1953, had never before been revived on Broadway. The Bernstein-Comden and Green score was highlighted beautifully by the Encores! music team.

In 2005, an Encores! transfer gave yet another of today’s top leading ladies a perfect part to shine in; Kristin Chenoweth led The Apple Tree from City Center to Studio 54 on Broadway. The three act structure of the show, which had never been revived on Broadway since its original 1966 production, allowed Chenoweth to shine gorgeously in three different scene-stealing roles.

The 2008 Broadway revival of Gypsy boasted one of Patti LuPone’s most iconic performances, as Rose. This Gypsy started out as an Encores! Summer Stars production. From 2007-2009, this series presented Gypsy, Damn Yankees, and The Wiz with all-star casts, during the summer, separate from the normal Encores! season.

The following year, Finian’s Rainbow headed from Encores! to Broadway. The political musical which addresses racial prejudice and satirizes economic injustice originally opened on Broadway in 1947. It had been twice revived on Broadway before the 2009 Encores! transfer, but the most recent revival was in 1960. This production gave modern audiences had the opportunity to enjoy and be affected by this important musical featuring popular songs including “How Are Things in Glocca Mora?” and “Old Devil Moon”. 

In 2011, Encores! presented its first special event, a new revue featuring beloved jazz classics called Cotton Club Parade. The thrilling show set in Harlem was retitled After Midnight when it transferred to the Lena Horne Theatre (which was then the Brooks Atkinson) in 2013. Special events take place in the fall, separate from the typical Encores! season. Two others in this category have also moved to Broadway: Sunday in the Park with George starring Annaleigh Ashford and Jake Gyllenhaal, which opened at the Hudson in 2017 and Parade starring Ben Platt and Micaela Diamond, which opened at the Jacobs in 2023. Both achieved highly successful limited runs on Broadway.

From 2013 to 2019, City Center Encores! presented 21 productions as part of Encores! Off-Center, which is currently on hiatus. While Encores! focuses on musicals that originally played Broadway, Encores! Off-Center presented musicals that originally opened off-Broadway. Off-Center’s first season in 2013 featured its only production to date that transferred to Broadway. This was Violet, starring Once Upon a Mattress’s current leading lady Sutton Foster, and with music by Off-Center’s founding artistic director Jeanine Tesori. Violet originally played off-Broadway in 1997, so its 2014 transfer to the American Airlines Theatre marked its Broadway debut.

Before Once Upon a Mattress, the most recent regular Encores! show to transfer to Broadway was Into The Woods. The production that opened in 2022 at the St. James had a few cast changes from the 2022 Encores! production, and opened only three months later. Into The Woods was the second Sondheim show to transfer from Encores! to Broadway and the first Sondheim show to start previews on Broadway following the death of the legendary writer in 2021.

While there are often Broadway transfer rumors that swirl around any well received Encores! production, Fiorello!, Chicago, Wonderful Town, The Apple Tree, Gypsy, Finian’s Rainbow, After Midnight, Violet, Sunday in the Park with George, Into The Woods, Parade, and Once Upon a Mattress are the twelve that have made the move to Broadway.

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