The Chicago Sun-Times reports that an announcement is expected on Monday for The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee to have a sitdown production in the city. The show, to be produced by Broadway in Chicago, is expected to be leasing the 550-seat Drury Lane Theatre Water Tower Place.
Starring Derrick
Baskin, Deborah S. Craig, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Dan Fogler, Lisa
Howard, Celia Keenan-Bolger, Jose Llana and Sarah Saltzberg in addition to Reiss, the show boasts music and lyrics by Finn (Falsettos, A New Brain), and a Tony Award-winning book by Rachel Sheinkin. Conceived by Rebecca Feldman and directed by James Lapine (Sunday in the Park with George, Falsettos),
the show (which was nominated for a 2005 Best Musical Tony) has broken
all house records at Circle in the Square Theatre (50th St., between
Broadway and 8th) and plays to sold-out audiences each week. In addition to Sheinkin, Fogler
(who plays William Barfee) received a Tony Award for Featured Actor in
a Musical.In the show, six young people in the throes of
puberty, overseen by grown-ups who barely managed to escape childhood
themselves, learn that winning isn't everything and that losing doesn't
necessarily make you a loser. A cast album is available on Ghostlight Records.
