Lincoln Center Theater to Produce South Pacific Revival

Lincoln Center Theater will produce the first Broadway revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic 1949 musical South Pacific as part of its 2007-2008 season. The show will be directed by Bartlett Sher, a Tony Award nominee for LCT’s current musical hit The Light in the Piazza and the director of the theater’s upcoming revival of Clifford Odets’ Awake and Sing!.

South Pacific has not been seen on the Great White Way since the original production closed in 1954 after a run of nearly 2,000 performances; however, there was a notable 1967 production at the New York State Theater, a 1987 production by the New York City Opera (also at the State Theater), and a 2005 concert performance at Carnegie Hall — starring Brian Stokes Mitchell, Reba McEntire, and Lillias White — that was videotaped and will be aired on PBS in April.

In recent years, there has also been an American tour of South Pacific starring Robert Goulet, a London revival that was directed by Trevor Nunn, and an acclaimed production at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.