Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, with Tracy Letts and Amy Morton, Will Arrive On Broadway in September

By Andrew Gans
and Kenneth Jones
17 May 2012

Amy Morton and Tracy Letts
Amy Morton and Tracy Letts
Photo by Michael Brosilow

Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? will return to Broadway in September in an acclaimed new production seen in 2010-11 at Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago and Arena Stage in Washington, DC. Tracy Letts and Amy Morton will again play George and Martha in the blistering dark comedy about a dysfunctional marriage within a dysfunctional Western Civilization.

The staging celebrates the 50th anniversary of the groundbreaking 1962 play. Pam MacKinnon again directs. Carrie Coon and Madison Dirks will reprise their work as Honey and Nick, respectively.

Previews, according to an Equity casting notice, will begin Sept. 27 at a Shubert theatre to be announced. As previously reported, opening night will be Oct. 13, exactly 50 years to the date after the play's original Broadway opening. 

This production of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? originally ran at the Chicago home of Steppenwolf Theatre Company (Dec. 13, 2010-Feb. 13, 2011) and then transferred to Washington, DC's Arena Stage (Feb. 25-April 10, 2011).

Here's how the production is characterized: "On the campus of a small New England college, George and Martha invite a new professor and his wife home for a nightcap. As the cocktails flow, the young couple finds themselves caught in the crossfire of a savage marital war where the combatants attack the self-deceptions they forged for their own survival. Steppenwolf ensemble members Tracy Letts (a Tony Award winner and Pulitzer Prize winner for August: Osage County) and Amy Morton (a Tony Award nominee for playing Barbara in August: Osage County) face off as one of theatre's most notoriously dysfunctional couples in Albee's hilarious and harrowing masterpiece."

The Broadway production will feature the original Steppenwolf creative team: Todd Rosenthal (set design), Nan Cibula-Jenkins (costume design), Allen Lee Hughes (light design) and Rob Milburn and Michael Bodeen (sound design).

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? will be presented on Broadway by Jeffrey Richards, Jerry Frankel, Susan Quint Gallin and Mary Lu Roffe in association with Steppenwolf Theatre Company (Artistic Director, Martha Lavey and Executive Director, David Hawkanson). Richards and Frankel previously teamed up with Steppenwolf to present ensemble member Tracy Letts' Tony and Pulitzer Prize-winning production of August: Osage County and Superior Donuts on Broadway.