From ‘Gypsy’ to ‘Dreamgirls’: Goodspeed Opera House announces its 2023 season

A stage version of a classic Judy Garland movie, two familiar hits with strong female leads and a new musical from a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and one of the most progressive directors in musical theater will all grace the Goodspeed Opera House in East Haddam next year.

Just as exciting is the news that there will be a 2023 season of new musicals at Goodspeed Musicals’ other performance space, the Norma Terris Theatre in Chester. There hasn’t been a show there since December of 2019. Show titles for the Norma Terris won’t be announced until March of 2023.

The 2023 Opera House season, announced Thursday afternoon, includes:

‘Gypsy’

April 28 through June 18, 2023

The 1959 musical “suggested by” the memoirs of famed stripper Gypsy Rose Lee, has a book by Arthur Laurents (”West Side Story,” “The Way We Were”), music by Jule Styne (”Funny Girl”) and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim (the last major show for which he wrote words for other people’s music before becoming a major composer/lyricist himself). The plum role in “Gypsy” is not Gypsy Rose Lee herself but her mother Mama Rose, which has been immortalized by Ethel Merman, Angela Lansbury, Bernadette Peters and others. “Gypsy” will be directed by Jenn Thompson, a regular presence at the Goodspeed whose credits there include “Bye Bye Birdie,” “Oklahoma,” The Music Man” and “Anne of Green Gables.”

‘Summer Stock’

July 7 through Aug. 27, 2023

The 1950 Hollywood movie, which starred Judy Garland, Gene Kelly, Gloria DeHaven and Phil Silvers, is ideal for a stage adaptation since it’s about staging a musical. The current Goodspeed hit “42nd Street” — based on a 1933 movie about the birth of a Broadway musical and using tunes from one of the same songwriters, Harry Warren — suggests that this is a good idea. Some of the other songwriters involved with the original Hollywood “Summer Stock” were Harold Arlen, Johnny Mercer, E.Y. Harburg and Billy Rose. The Goodspeed says the musical will be based on the original screenplay by George Wells and Sy Gromberg but hasn’t mentioned who will be adapting or directing the project. Judy Garland was the subject of bio-musical, “Chasing Rainbows,” at the Goodspeed Opera House in 2016.

‘The 12′

Sept. 8 through Oct. 29, 2023

John Doyle, whose Broadway revivals of “Sweeney Todd” in 2004, “Company” in 2006 and “The Color Purple” in 2015 are the stuff of legend, has been lured to the Goodspeed to helm a new musical about how the disciples of Jesus Christ react following their savior’s death. The script is by Robert Schenkkan, author of the Pulitzer-winning “Kentucky Cycle” and the LBJ bio-drama “All the Way.” “The 12″ has been around in various forms for over a decade in concert or workshop versions but this will be a major new production.

‘Dreamgirls’

Nov. 10-30, 2023

The Tom Eyen/ Henry Krieger musical about the rise of ‘60s girl groups such as the Supremes, will be directed by Lili-Anne Brown, who is based in Chicago and has worked at the Goodman and Victory Gardens theaters there. “Dreamgirls” premiered in 1982, but is nonetheless a rather “new” show for the Goodspeed, which tends to revive shows from the 1940s through the ‘60s (when not premiering all-new works). “Dreamgirls” will be the first show in the main Goodspeed Opera House season to feature a predominantly Black cast since “Abyssinia” in 2005.

Casting has not been announced for any of the shows.

Some shows that were announced for past Goodspeed seasons but were postponed or canceled due to the COVID pandemic are not on the schedule again. These include “South Pacific,” for which sets were being built and actors days away from rehearsals in the spring of 2020, and “Candide,” which would have been directed by Darko Tresnjak.

The Goodspeed returned to a full four-show Opera House season this year with “Cabaret,” “Anne of Green Gables,” “42nd Street” (currently running, through Nov. 6) and the upcoming “Christmas in Connecticut” (Nov. 18 through Dec. 30). The theater’s leadership since January of 2021 has been artistic director Donna Lynn Hilton, who has worked for the company in various capacities since the late 1980s, and managing director David Byrd.

Four-show season ticket packages, starting at $116, go on sale Oct. 17. Single tickets to the shows won’t go on sale until March. More information on the Goodspeed is at goodspeed.org.

Christopher Arnott can be reached at carnott@courant.com.