EXCLUSIVE: Douglas Carter Beane’s newest play, Fairycakes, will make its world premiere this fall Off Broadway at the Greenwich House Theater in a production starring Mo Rocca, Jackie Hoffman, Julie Halston, Brooks Ashmanskas, Alfie Fuller and Jason Tam.
Beane will direct the play at the venue, home to many of his previous works. The comedy will also feature Kuhoo Verma, Ann Harada and Jamen Nanthakumar in the cast.
Fairycakes begins its limited engagement at the Greenwich House on Thursday, October 14, and run through January 2, 2022. The announcement was made by producer Thomas Laub.
“Doug Beane’s new play is wildly original, hysterically funny and deeply moving – and it’s a chance for me finally to speak in iambic pentameter outside the house,” Rocca said in a statement to Deadline. “How could I say no?”
The play is described as an “uproarious clash of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and old-world fairy tales.” The synopsis reads: One night in the woods, puckish mischief leads to mismatched lovers from across all your favorite stories. And what begins as love at first sprite, grows into something more as the feelings from one midsummer night carry over to the bright light of day.
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“After this last year and a half,” Beane said, “I wanted to create a show with characters learning to get along with one another, characters finding connections, characters owning their mistakes, trying to be better, and forgiving others for their failings. And finally, after this time away from it, I wanted to be in a theatre and laugh with a bunch of strangers, to be with this cast of five-star comedians, me writing as funny as I can in the Greenwich House Theatre, my theatrical home.”
Beane’s previous works include the Tony-nominated The Little Dog Laughed, As Bees in Honey Drown, The Country Club, Sister Act and The Nance. He wrote the screenplay for 1995’s To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar.
Rocca is a correspondent and humorist for CBS Sunday Morning and appeared on Broadway in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee. Hoffman’s many stage credits include Xanadu and Fiddler on the Roof in Yiddish, and she was nominated for an Emmy Award for her role as Mamacita in the miniseries Feud (2017). Halston most recently appeared onstage in Broadway’s Tootsie, and Ashmanskas was an original cast member of The Prom.
Fuller’s credits include BLKS, while Verma appeared in Hulu’s Plan B, Harada in Avenue Q, Nanthakumar in the play The Kill One Race and Tam in Be More Chill.
Additional casting will be announced soon.
The Fairycakes creative team includes Shoko Kambara & Adam Crinson (scenic design), Gregory Gale (costume design) and Jeanette Oi-Suk Yew (lighting design). Music contributions by Lewis Flinn.