Starry ‘Carousel’ Heads to Broadway From Producer Scott Rudin

A new Broadway production of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s 1945 musical “Carousel” has lined up a spring 2018 opening, in a production backed by Scott Rudin and Roy Furman and starring Tony winner Jessie Mueller (“Beautiful,” “Waitress”), Joshua Henry (“Shuffle Along,” “The Scottsboro Boys”) and opera star Renee Fleming.

Jack O’Brien, the Broadway regular (“Hairspray”) who directed “The Front Page” for Rudin this season and is currently at work on the soon-to-open “Charlie on the Chocolate Factory,” directs, with choreography by Justin Peck, the resident choreographer of the New York City Ballet. Two members of the NYCB company, Amar Ramasar and Brittany Pollack, will also be part of the cast.

Although the 2016-17 Broadway season is just winding down — with a sizable batch of new shows still to open before the April 27 cutoff — elements of the 2017-18 slate have already come into focus. “Carousel” marks the second big-ticket revival of a classic musical set to go up next season, alongside a new staging of “My Fair Lady” from Lincoln Center Theater and director Bartlett Sher, who has previously directed tentpole Rodgers and Hammerstein revivals “South Pacific” and “The King and I” for LCT.

Mueller and Henry will play the central couple of Julie Jordan and Billy Bigelow in “Carousel,” with Fleming, the opera-world star who is currently winding down her career in opera, on board as Nettie Fowler.

The revival is set to open March 23, 2018, with the exact theater still to be locked in.

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