Fall 2024 is Broadway’s Most Star-Studded Season Ever

These 11 shows starring theater, film and TV celebrities make a trip to the Great White Way a must this season

Nicholas DeRenzo,

AARP

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Published September 17, 2024

Patti LuPone sitting on a stool on stage in the Broadway show The Roommate

Patti LuPone in "The Roommate."

SARA KRULWICH/The New York Times/Redux

Broadway has always been a magnet for (and source of) A-list talent, but this fall’s schedule of upcoming and newly opened shows is particularly starry. From hilarious new musicals to topical dramas to classic revivals, the season is filled with stars returning to their theater roots or making their Broadway debuts. The lineup includes Oscar, Grammy, Emmy and Tony winners — plus the most Tony-winning performer in theater history. If you want to go celebrity spotting around New York’s theater district, here’s your ultimate watch list.

Once Upon a Mattress

On Broadway through Nov. 30

Carol Burnett, 91, burst onto the scene with her Tony-nominated role in this 1959 fractured fairy tale. The latest revival boasts a freshly adapted book that’s been zhuzhed up by Amy Sherman-Palladino, 58, the creator of Gilmore Girls and The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. Its cast features a slew of next-generation TV comedy stars, including Sutton Foster (Younger) in Burnett’s star-making role, Princess Winnifred the Woebegone; Michael Urie (Ugly Betty) as Prince Dauntless; and SNL legend Ana Gasteyer, 57, as Queen Aggravain.

Get tickets: Once Upon a Mattress

The Roommate

On Broadway through Dec. 15

In 2022, Patti LuPone, 75, publicly declared that she’d quit Actors’ Equity and would leave Broadway for good. But the decision didn’t stick. She was starring opposite Mia Farrow, 79, in this odd-couple comedy about two very different women who move in together to pay the bills, until Farrow got COVID after opening night, and Marsha Mason, 82, stepped into the role. Stay tuned to see if Farrow returns. She hasn’t had much experience on the Broadway stage — her last gig was a few-week stint in Love Letters in 2014 — so when she gets better and if she’s back onstage, fans shouldn’t pass up the opportunity to see the sort-of-retired actress live.

Get tickets: The Roommate

McNeal

On Broadway through Nov. 24

Recent Oscar winner Robert Downey Jr., 59, is making his Broadway debut in this Lincoln Center production by Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright Ayad Akhtar. He stars as a celebrated novelist named Jacob McNeal, who has “an unhealthy fascination with artificial intelligence.” The show costars The Office’s Melora Hardin, 57, SCTV icon Andrea Martin, 77, The King and I Tony winner Ruthie Ann Miles and a “highly realistic Metahuman Digital Likeness” of Robert Downey Jr. Consider us intrigued.

Get tickets: McNeal

Yellow Face

On Broadway through Nov. 24

Daniel Dae Kim, 56 (Jin-Soo Kwon from Lost, Chin Ho Kelly from Hawaii Five-O, Dr. Jackson Han from The Good Doctor), returns to the Broadway stage after playing the king of Siam in Lincoln Center’s The King and I in 2016. He’s starring in this Pulitzer-finalist 2007 play by David Henry Hwang, 67, a semi-autobiographical work about controversies surrounding the casting of white actors in Asian roles. The satire touches on some hot-button topics, but it’s done with heaps of good humor.

Get tickets: Yellow Face

Our Town

Previews begin Sept. 17; on Broadway through Jan. 19

Edward Albee called this 1938 Thornton Wilder classic “the greatest American play ever written,” and chances are you read it in high school or saw a community theater production. Set in the small town of Grover’s Corners, New Hampshire, from 1901 to 1913, this tale of everyday life returns to Broadway for the sixth time, led by Jim Parsons, 51, as the stage manager and an ensemble cast that includes Katie Holmes and Zoey Deutch.

Get tickets: Our Town

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Left on Tenth

Previews begin Sept. 26; on Broadway through Feb. 2

Julianna Margulies, 58, and Peter Gallagher, 69, star in this real-life romantic comedy, which Delia Ephron, 80, adapted from her own memoir. And Ephron knows a thing or two about rom-coms: In addition to writing more than a dozen books, she’s responsible for the screenplay of You’ve Got Mail, directed by her late sister Nora.

Get tickets: Left on Tenth

Romeo + Juliet

Previews begin Sept. 26; on Broadway through Feb. 16

This sure-to-be-innovative adaptation of Shakespeare’s teen romance features music by Jack Antonoff (lead singer of Bleachers and 11-time Grammy-winning producer known for his work with Taylor Swift) and choreography by Tony winner Sonya Tayeh (So You Think You Can Dance). Appearing as the star-crossed lovers are Kit Connor (Netflix’s Heartstopper) and Rachel Zegler. The storyline shouldn’t be much of a stretch for our Juliet: She made her film debut playing Maria in Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story remake.

Get tickets: Romeo + Juliet

Sunset Boulevard

Previews begin Sept. 28

When his last show, Bad Cinderella, closed in June 2023, it marked the first time Andrew Lloyd Webber, 76, didn’t have a musical on Broadway since 1979! The British legend stages a comeback with this highly anticipated revival of Sunset Boulevard, a stripped-down, high-tech production that took the London theater world by storm last year and won seven Olivier Awards. Crossing the pond with the show is former Pussycat Dolls singer Nicole Scherzinger, who earned raves for channeling the fading silent-screen star Norma Desmond.

Get tickets: Sunset Boulevard

Maybe Happy Ending

Previews begin Oct. 16

Glee scene-stealer Darren Criss stars opposite newcomer Helen J Shen in this sci-fi tinged musical romantic comedy, and the plot is a wild one: They play obsolete “helperbots,” Oliver and Claire, who live in an apartment building on the outskirts of Seoul and meet cute when she drops by to borrow his charger. Cowritten by South Korean lyricist Hue Park and American musician Will Aronson, the musical premiered in Seoul in 2016 and answers the question “Can robots fall in love?”

Get tickets: Maybe Happy Ending

Death Becomes Her

Previews begin Oct. 23

In a musical adaptation of the 1992 camp classic film, in which Meryl Streep, 75, and Goldie Hawn, 78, play rivals who drink an immortality potion and then enter a cycle of increasingly surreal violence and vengeance, Megan Hilty (Smash) and Jennifer Simard, 54 (Company), play the dueling divas, with Destiny’s Child member Michelle Williams stepping into the role originated by Isabella Rossellini, 72.

Get tickets: Death Becomes Her

Gypsy

Previews begin Nov. 21

The reigning queen of contemporary Broadway, Audra McDonald, 54, is the most-awarded performer in Tony history and the first to win across all four categories for which she is eligible (actress and featured actress in a musical and a play). This November, she’s following Ethel Merman, Tyne Daly, 78, Bernadette Peters, 76, and Patti LuPone, 75, into the role of Rose, the stage mother to Gypsy Rose Lee — the first time a Black actress has taken on the role on Broadway.

Get tickets: Gypsy

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Nicholas DeRenzo is a contributing writer who covers entertainment and travel. Previously he was executive editor of United Airlines’ Hemispheres magazine and his work has appeared in the New York Times, Conde Nast Traveler, Travel & Leisure, Sunset and New York magazine.