In Merrily We Roll Along, audiences are swept along a journey of three decades of friendship between three friends. In the first-ever Broadway revival of the Stephen Sondheim musical, Daniel Radcliffe, Lindsay Mendez, and Jonathan Groff play those three old friends onstage every evening—but the friendship doesn't end when the curtain closes.
"You know when you're on a date or something, and it just clicks?" Groff said at the opening night red carpet, where the trio gushed about their mutual adoration for each other. "We love each other!" Radcliffe vouched.
While Mendez and Groff had been friends for several years, Radcliffe was a "wild card" addition to their friendship, which only strengthened and deepened as they prepared for the hit revival. "Jonathan and I have been friends for a long time...We came up at the same time on Broadway. Dan was the wild card, but when we all found out we were going to do this together, we started video messaging, and we were like, 'Oh, we're all kind of obsessed with each other, how weird!'" Mendez shared.
"To be so in love with the two people that are playing your best friends in something, frankly, just makes my job so much easier," Radcliffe said.
To see full footage of the cast of Merrily We Roll Along chatting it up on the red carpet, check out the video above.
Sondheim and George Furth's Merrily We Roll Along officially opened October 10 at the Hudson Theatre. The limited run is set to continue through March 24, 2024.
Back leading the production after starring in the 2022 Off-Broadway run at New York Theatre Workshop are Radcliffe as Charley Kringas, Groff as Franklin Shepard, Mendez as Mary Flynn, Krystal Joy Brown as Gussie Carnegie, Katie Rose Clarke as Beth Shepard, and Reg Rogers as Joe Josephson. Max Rackenberg and Brady Wagner are sharing the role of Frank Jr.
The company also includes Sherz Aletaha, Maya Boyd, Leana Rae Concepcion, Corey Mach, Talia Robinson, Jamila Sabares-Klemm, Brian Sears, Evan Alexander Smith, Christian Strange, Vishal Vaidya, Natalie Wachen, and Jacob Keith Watson. Rounding out the company as swings are Morgan Kirner, Amanda Rose, and Koray Tarhan. Casting is by Jim Carnahan and Jason Thinger.
Photos: Inside the Rehearsal Room for the Upcoming Broadway Revival of Merrily We Roll Along
Maria Friedman is back directing, with choreography by Tim Jackson and orchestrations by Jonathan Tunick. Scenic and costume design are by Soutra Gilmour, with lighting design by Amith Chandrashaker, sound design by Kai Harada, hair and wig design by Cookie Jordan, music supervision by Catherine Jayes, music direction by Joel Fram, associate music supervision by Alvin Hough, Jr., and music coordination by Kristy Norter.
With a book by Furth—adapted from the George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart play of the same name—and a score by Sondheim, the musical tracks the lives of three friends navigating the entertainment industry over three decades in reverse chronological order. Sondheim's score includes such songs as "Old Friends," "Now You Know," "Franklin Shepard, Inc.," "Good Thing Going," and "Not a Day Goes By."
READ: Lindsay Mendez Returns to Broadway With Merrily We Roll Along
The work was not a success on its first Broadway outing, running just 16 performances and ending the string of genre-defining collaborations between Sondheim and director Hal Prince. Together with the popularity of the show's original Broadway cast album, a revised version of the show has transformed the work into a cult favorite. This current production was originally staged at London's Menier Chocolate Factory in 2012 and later transferred to the West End, where it won an Olivier Award for Best Musical Revival. Huntington Theatre in Boston gave the staging its North American premiere in 2017.
