The Gates Are Almost Open! CHARLIE AND THE CHOCOLATE FACTORY, Starring Christian Borle, Sets Spring Broadway Bow

The factory is almost open! Producers for Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, starring two-time Tony Award winner Christian Borle, just announced the show will begin performances Tuesday, March 28, 2017 and officially opens Sunday, April 23, 2017 at Broadway's Lunt-Fontanne Theatre (205 West 46th Street).

Plus, watch two new trailers for the production HERE!

Directed by three-time Tony Award winner Jack O'Brien, Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory features music by Grammy, Emmy and Tony Award winner Marc Shaiman, lyrics by Grammy and Tony Award winners Scott Wittman and Marc Shaiman, a book by Artistic Director of Edinburgh's Royal Lyceum theatre David Greig and choreography by Tony Award nominee and Emmy Award winner Joshua Bergasse. The production includes additional songs by Leslie Bricusse and Anthony Newley from the 1971 Warner Bros. motion picture.

Five-time Tony Award nominee Mark Thompson returns to Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory for the Broadway production as scenic and costume designer.

Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory will also feature lighting design by four-time Tony Award nominee Japhy Weideman, sound design by Andrew Keister, puppet design by Obie and Drama Desk Award winner Basil Twist, and orchestrations by three-time Tony Award winner Doug Besterman.

For more than 50 years Roald Dahl's story of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory has captured imaginations around the world, and now for the first time Broadway audiences are invited to experience Willy Wonka's delightful and semi-dark chocolate world first-hand. Willy Wonka, world famous inventor of the Everlasting Gobstopper, has just made an astonishing announcement. His marvelous-and mysterious-factory is opening its gates...to a lucky few. That includes young Charlie Bucket, whose life definitely needs sweetening. He and four other golden ticket winners will embark on a mesmerizing, life-changing journey through Wonka's world of pure imagination. Get ready for chocolate waterfalls, exquisitely nutty squirrels and the great glass elevator, all to be revealed by Wonka's army of curious Oompa-Loompas.

Additional casting by will be announced shortly. Casting is by Telsey + Company/Rachel Hoffman, CSA.

The Broadway production of Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory is produced by Warner Bros. Theatre Ventures (Mark Kaufman), Langley Park Productions (Kevin McCormick) and Neal Street Productions (Sam Mendes, Caro Newling).

The Olivier and Evening Standard Award-winning London production of Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, directed by Sam Mendes and choreographed by Peter Darling, is one of the West End's most popular and successful stage musicals and has broken house records at Theatre Royal Drury Lane where it has been seen by over 2.1 million people since it opened in June 2013. Now in its fourth and final year, it currently sits alongside Miss Saigonand 42nd Street in the top three longest-running productions of the last 50 years at the historic venue, one of London's largest theatres.

Roald Dahl was a spy, ace fighter-pilot, chocolate historian and medical inventor. He was also the author of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Matilda, The BFG and many more brilliant stories. He remains the World's No.1 storyteller. Born in Cardiff of Norwegian descent, Roald Dahl (1916-1990) joined the RAF at the age of 23 and began writing, initially for adults, after being injured in a plane crash during WW2. Sitting in a hut at the bottom of his garden, surrounded by odd bits and pieces such as a suitcase (used as a footrest), his own hipbone (which he'd had replaced) and a heavy ball of metal foil (made from years' worth of chocolate wrappers), he went on to write some of the world's best-loved children's stories. His first children's story, James and the Giant Peach, published in 1961, was a hit and every subsequent book became a best-seller. Today, his stories are available in 58 languages and, by a conservative estimate, he has sold more than 200 million books. Many of these stories have also been adapted for stage and screen, including the 1971 film classic Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory, Wes Anderson's acclaimed Fantastic Mr Fox, and the multi-award winning Matilda The Musical from the RSC with music by Tim Minchin. The latest Roald Dahl story to hit the big screen is Steven Spielberg's #1 box office blockbuster The BFG. Entitled Roald Dahl 100, 2016 marks 100 years since the birth of Roald Dahl. Celebrations continue around the world, with lots happening in cities across the US, delivering a calendar packed with gloriumptious treats and surprises for everyone. We believe in doing good things. That's why ten percent of all Roald Dahl income* goes to our charity partners. We have supported causes including: specialist children's nurses, grants for families in need, and educational outreach programmes. Find out more at roalddahl.com. The Roald Dahl Charitable Trust is a registered UK charity (no. 1119330). * All author payments and royalty income net of third party commissions. For more about the author, visit www.roalddahl.com.