Hot Seat: Crombie Will Be Back in Broadway's Drowsy Aug. 21; Glover Exits Aug. 19

By Kenneth Jones
17 Aug 2007

Jonathan Crombie
Jonathan Crombie

Jonathan Crombie, the charming Canadian actor who filled the easy chair of The Drowsy Chaperone when Bob Martin exited the show in the spring, will return to the Marquis Theatre Aug. 21.

Crombie assumes the role from Tony Award winner John Glover, who will play his final performance as Man in Chair Aug. 19 before returning to shoot the seventh season of the hit CW series "Smallville."

Crombie — widely known for playing Gilbert Blythe in the popular Canadian mini-series "Anne of Green Gables" — initially made his Broadway debut as Man in Chair March 13-April 22. His Canadian credits include Oxford Roof Climber's Rebellion, Dishwashers (Tarragon); This Could Be Love (Artword); Ouch My Toe (Fringe); The Drowsy Chaperone as Gangster #2 (Fringe, TPM, Winter Garden); Romeo & Juliet, Oedipus Rex, Hamlet, Comedy of Errors (Stratford Festival); Arcadia, Last Romantics, What the Butler Saw (CanStage); and more.

The Drowsy Chaperone is directed and choreographed by Tony Award nominee Casey Nicholaw (Spamalot), with music and lyrics by Tony Award winners Lisa Lambert and Greg Morrison and a book by Tony Award winners Bob Martin and Don McKellar.

A North American tour starring Bob Martin, Georgia Engel and Nancy Opel launches in September. Crombie will take over Martin's Man in Chair role on the tour after Toronto.

"To chase his blues away, a modern day musical theatre addict known simply as Man in Chair drops the needle on his favorite cast album — the 1928 musical comedy The Drowsy Chaperone," and the show comes to life around him, in his hermetic studio apartment, according to the producers. "We are instantly immersed in the hilarious tale of a glamorous bride and her uproarious wedding day, complete with thrills and surprises that take both the cast (literally) and the audience (metaphorically) soaring into the heavens."