Panic! At The Disco Frontman Brendon Urie to Join Broadway’s ‘Kinky Boots’
Brendon Urie, the lead member of rock band Panic! At The Disco, has signed on for a summer run in the Broadway musical “Kinky Boots,” playing Charlie, the young man who takes over his family’s struggling shoe factory.
Pop stars sometimes pop at the Broadway box office, as currently evidenced by the recent addition of Sara Bareilles to the cast of the musical she wrote, “Waitress.” In prior seasons, sales at Green Day musical “American Idiot” similarly jumped when the band’s frontman, Billie Joe Armstrong, would step into the show. The four-year-old “Kinky Boots” could use a bit of a boost, as sales have softened noticeably (though not drastically) over the last couple of years.
Urie arrives on Broadway after five albums with Panic! At The Disco, the most recent of which, “Death of a Bachelor” (which included the song “Victorious”) was the top album on the Billboard 200 chart. He joins a “Kinky Boots” cast that will also include J. Harrison Ghee as Lola, the drag performer who helps Charlie revitalize the business, and Taylor Louderman.
The Tony-winning musical has added notable names to the cast in the past, with Wayne Brady and Todrick Hall each getting a stint as Lola, the role for which Billy Porter won a 2013 Tony Award. Stark Sands played Charlie in the show’s original cast opposite Porter.
Urie begins his run in “Kinky Boots” May 26, remaining with the show through Aug. 6.
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