Opening Night Diary: The Return of Chicago on Broadway

Until Broadway shut down in March of 2020, Chicago had been running uninterrupted for nearly 24 years. On the night of September 14, the hit musical—about a pair of Jazz Age murderesses with dreams of stardom—roared back to life at the Ambassador Theatre, and it seemed as though no time had passed at all.

Opening night wasn’t just the return of the Walter Bobbie-directed show, however, it was also the first public performance for a slate of new cast members including Ana Villafañe as Roxie Hart, Bianca Marroquín as Velma Kelly, Lillias White as Mama Morton, and Paolo Szot as Billy Flynn.

“When I first decided to go for this, there wasn’t a lot of time—there was a less than a week before starting rehearsals,” says Villafañe, who previously played Gloria Estefan in On Your Feet! “I didn’t realize how hard it would be, and how you’re being shot out of a canon. Roxie’s an emotional rollercoaster; the whole show centers around her murdering [the man with whom she’s having an affair]. There’s a distinct energy and it’s giftwrapped in these sensual, delicious moves. It’s a very glamorous, very crazy character. Right now, I’ve only done it twice for an audience—we didn’t do previews—so I hope I’ll keep discovering who my Roxie is as we go forward. I’m interested to see what it’ll feel like in a week and a week after that. That’s the beauty of theater, things can grow.”

Here, Villafañe opens her personal camera roll to T&C to share a behind-the-scenes look at the opening night of Chicago, and the moments that audiences didn’t see on stage.