Theater News

Once on This Island to Receive Broadway Revival Directed by Michael Arden

The Ahrens and Flaherty musical is heading back to the stage.

Michael Arden will direct a new Broadway production of Once on This Island.
Michael Arden will direct a new Broadway production of Once on This Island.
(© David Gordon)

A new production of Lynn Ahrens and Stephen Flaherty's musical Once on This Island, directed by recent Spring Awakening Tony nominee Michael Arden, is preparing for an upcoming Broadway engagement.

The 1990 musical, featuring a book and lyrics by Ahrens and music by Flaherty, will have an exploratory reading this December, with Jason Michael Webb serving as musical director and featuring new orchestrations by Michael Starobin. Ann Marie Milazzo will serve as vocal designer. Ken Davenport will serve as producer of the full Broadway run, a timeline and casting for which will be announced in the future.

Once On This Island is a theatrical Caribbean adaptation of the story of The Little Mermaid in which a peasant girl rescues and falls in love with a wealthy boy from the other side of her island. The show premiered at Playwrights Horizons in 1990 and transferred to Broadway later that year. It received eight 1991 Tony nominations, including Best Musical, Best Book, Best Score, and Best Featured Actress in a Musical for its leading lady, LaChanze.