Jennifer Ashley Tepper's The Jonathan Larson Project will close Off-Broadway March 30. The production began previews at the Orpheum Theatre February 14, and officially opened March 10. At the time of closing, it will have played 27 previews and 24 regular performances.
Directed by John Simpkins, the project celebrates the dozens of seldom-heard songs, unfinished and unproduced musicals, and pop songs found in files and boxes when the visionary writer of Rent died suddenly at the age of 35 in 1996.
Conceived by Tepper, The Jonathan Larson Project contains songs from a variety of unproduced Larson shows, including 1984 and Superbia, as well as songs that were cut from Rent and tick, tick…BOOM!, songs written for theatrical revues and for the radio, and a variety of songs never publicly performed or recorded before The Jonathan Larson Project. The project was originally presented as a concert at 54 Below in Fall 2018 and was released as an album from Ghostlight Records in 2019.
The production stars Adam Chanler-Berat, Taylor Iman Jones, Lauren Marcus, Andy Mientus, and Jason Tam, with Gilbert L. Bailey II and Jessie Hooker-Bailey as standbys. Both Marcus and Mientus have been with the project since its initial concert presentation.
Tepper had been working on the show for over a decade. In a statement posted to Facebook, she wrote that it was "heartbreaking" that the show was closing earlier than planned: "It's no secret that it's incredibly difficult to hit the numbers needed in order to run a commercial Off-Broadway musical in the current theatrical climate. I am deeply proud of the valiant efforts our team made to try to do that because we believed in The Jonathan Larson Project. I am deeply proud of the passionate reactions we've received from audiences every night. And I am deeply proud of our beautiful show and everyone who made it." She then ended her note with "the world hasn't heard the last of The Jonathan Larson Project."
The Jonathan Larson Project features music supervision and orchestrations by Charlie Rosen and co-arrangements by Rosen and Natalie Tenenbaum, choreography by Byron Easley, and music direction by Cynthia Meng. Casting is by The Telsey Office's Rachel Hoffman, with general management by Evan Bernardin Productions.
Visit TheJonathanLarsonProject.com.
