THE NEXT NEW HAVEN?

Meet the U.K. theater that transatlantic producers are flocking to

Birmingham Rep. Photo: Ross Jukes

Ahoy and welcome to your guide to the global theater industry, Jaques, where I’ve returned from five days on the Broadway Cruise to discover that yet another new musical has crammed into an already jam-packed Broadway season. New to Jaques? Get more deets here, and if you’re looking for the latest ABROAD/WAY BULLETPOINTS, my regular roundup of international theater headlines, that’s over this way.

(You’ll notice that this week’s edition has once again landed in your inbox on Wednesday instead of Tuesday. I’m trying not make a habit of it! But this one needed another day in the oven.)

Back in November I wrote about the startling cost gap between producing a new musical for Broadway vs. producing the same new musical for the West End, and I delved into all the reasons it’s cheaper—often much cheaper—in the U.K. right now. It seemed like only a matter of time before those lower costs would start to lure American producers abroad.

BROADWAY AND THE WEST END: THE COST GAP AS WIDE AS THE ATLANTIC

Turns out it’s already happening—and one theater in particular is turning heads among transatlantic producers. Birmingham Rep, a storied theater in a town 120 miles northwest of London, first got the industry’s attention when Sinatra, the new bio-musical starring Tony winner Matt Doyle and backed by Universal Music Group Theatrical and Frank Sinatra Enterprises, premiered there in September with a clear eye on Broadway and beyond. Take a look at the Rep’s 2023-24 slate, and you’ll see that Sinatra was just the first of a string of projects to bring in international collaborators and high-profile productions with global prospects.

That’s no accident. It’s the result of efforts spearheaded by Sean Foley, who joined the Rep as artistic director in 2019—and it’s a strategy that seems to be working.

In this SPOTLIGHT STORY, I’ll highlight:

• Birmingham Rep’s formidable history and the new artistic director’s concerted push to put the Rep back on the map,

• the basics of an enhancement deal at the Rep,

• the facilities the Rep brings to the table,

• the shows stopping there with clear international potential, and

• why the Rep’s strategy is a matter of survival in a difficult local funding climate.

Back in the day, New Haven was the iconic pre-Broadway tryout town, launching legendary shows like The Sound of Music, A Streetcar Named Desire and Oklahoma! Here’s why the next New Haven might just be in Birmingham.

FLY ME TO THE MOON BIRMINGHAM

It was around this time last year that the Tony-winning actor Matt Doyle (Company) got the call telling him that Sinatra, the Broadway-bound project he’s headlining, would have its world premiere production in September 2023—at Birmingham Repertory Theatre, an institution he’d never heard of in Birmingham, England.

“I did think it was a really strange choice at first, especially for a show about an American icon like Frank Sinatra,” Doyle tells me. “But then I realized it was actually the best thing to do.”