Here We Are, the final musical written by Stephen Sondheim, crosses the pond to make a European premiere at London's National Theatre beginning April 25, ahead of a May 8 opening night. Tony winner Joe Mantello is again at the helm after staging the work's 2023 world premiere Off-Broadway at The Shed. The work features a book by David Ives.
Much of the cast for the U.K. bow are new to the production, including Tony winners Jesse Tyler Ferguson as Paul Zimmer, Jane Krakowski as Marianne Brink, and Paulo Szot as Raffael Santello Di Santicci; Chumisa Dornford-May (The Great Comet) as Fritz; Richard Fleeshman (Company) as Soldier; Harry Hadden-Paton (Downton Abbey) as Bishop; Cameron Johnson (Guys and Dolls) as Colonel Martin; Martha Plimpton (Sweat) as Claudia Bursik-Zimmer; and Roy Kinnear (No Time to Die) as Leo Brink. Reprising their work from the world premiere are Tracie Bennett (Follies) as Woman and Denis O'Hare as Man. Ensemble and understudies include Edward Baker-Duly, Alastair Brookshaw, Jack Butterworth, Molly Lynch, Amira Matthews, and Steven Serlin. Casting is by Bryony Jarvis-Taylor.
In conjunction with the European premiere, Nick Hern Books is publishing the script to the show. Pre-order it at .
The two-act musical draws inspiration from the Luis Bu帽uel-directed films The Discreet Charm of the Bourgeoisie (1972) and The Exterminating Angel (1962), both set at surrealist dinner parties. The musical, Sondheim said, is about 鈥渢rying to find a place to have dinner.鈥� The first deals with interruptions to dinner, the second is about 鈥減eople who have dinner and can鈥檛 leave,鈥� which 鈥渋s my cheerful view of the world today.鈥� The book is by Ives, and music and lyrics are by Sondheim.
The musical has been in the works since at least 2014 and was developed by The Public Theater in 2016. In 2021, The New York Times reported that Sondheim and Ives had abandoned the project, but conflicting reports in the months after reported that the pair was not done with the idea. Sondheim died in 2021, but reportedly sanctioned a staging of the musical and considered his compositional work on the project completed before his passing. Here We Are premiered at The Shed in 2023, with a cast that included Rachel Bay Jones, David Hyde Pierce, Bobby Cannavale, Micaela Diamond, Amber Gray, Jeremy Shamos, Steven Pasquale, Jin Ha, and Francois Battiste.
Mantello has reassembled his Off-Broadway creative team for the London bow, with set and costume designer David Zinn, choreographer Sam Pinkleton, lighting designer Natasha Katz, and sound designer Tom Gibbons all reprising their work. The musical features orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick and additional arrangements by Alexander Gemignani, who conducted the Off-Broadway premiere. Nigel Lilley conducts the London production.
Tickets are available at .
