Country Star Orville Peck Sets Broadway Debut in ‘Cabaret’ — Will He Unmask?
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Broadway’s Tony Award-winning revival of Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club has a new Emcee, and it looks to be a role that’ll be very revealing for the star playing him.
On Wednesday, Jan. 15, producers announced that queer country star Orville Peck will step into the shoes of the leading character in director Rebecca Frecknall’s production of the landmark 1966 musical, currently running at the August Wilson Theatre in New York City.
It’s a milestone moment for the South African-born, Canadian-raised singer, who makes his Broadway debut in the production. And it just might be a milestone moment for fans of Peck’s, too.
In his professional performance career, the deep-voiced crooner has famously concealed his face a different mask each time he performed, a move he said he started as a nod to the troupe of the country outlaw. And though the Emcee wears many masks himself in Cabaret, they’re more metaphorical, begging many to wonder whether Peck will ditch his trademark anonymity when he takes the stage by showing his face.
Fans will have to wait until this Spring to see it for sure. The 37-year-old begins performances on Monday, March 21. His limited 16-week engagement wraps on Sunday, July 20.
Joining him in the production will be Grammy winning theater star Eva Noblezada, currently treading the boards in The Great Gatsby. She’ll play Sally Bowles, the fictional English singer who performs at the Emcee’s Kit Kat Club.
Adam Lambert and Auli’i Cravalho, who are currently in the roles, will play their final performances in the production on Saturday, March 29.
Prior to launching his wildly successful musical career, Peck studied acting at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA) and worked in classical theater on London’s West End.
“The Emcee has been my dream role since I was a teenager,” said Peck, in a statement released Wednesday. “The nature of the character allows for complete freedom of individual expression. It can be portrayed through such a vast range of emotions, perspectives, and performance styles. That kind of freedom is every actor’s dream.”
“I truly cannot believe I’m getting to make my Broadway debut in one of my favorite shows and in probably my favorite role in all of musical theater,” he added. “I grew up in the theater. I was a working actor and a dancer for many years before I started making music. I did the hustle, and the struggle, for a long time, trying to make things happen for myself. But it taught me so much of who I am as a performer and a person, so it feels very full circle to be making a return to it at this point in my career.”
Noblezada, who wraps her run as ‘Daisy Buchanan’ in The Great Gatsby on Jan. 30., also expressed her excitement about the role.
“While studying musical theater in school, Cabaret always stood out,” the 28-year-old, two-time Tony nominee said. “I was, and am, amazed by the lineage of theater royalty who have been in the show. And Sally Bowles to me is simply… fascinating. She is like a totally conscious child who is also completely unhinged. Almost clownish. But real and raw and in your face. And that character amidst and against that backdrop of such an evil reality is painfully surreal.”
“I am totally psyched to start learning more,” she said. “And I am ready to be as submissive as possible to the iconic world that is Cabaret.”
Cabaret at the Kit Kat Club originally opened on April 2024, with Eddie Redmayne and Gayle Rankin.
Based on John Van Druten’s 1951 play I Am a Camera, which in turn was adapted from the 1939 novel Goodbye to Berlin by Christopher Isherwood, the musical follows fictional American writer Clifford Bradshaw as he moves to Berlin amid the rise of the Nazi party. His observations about the eccentric characters that populate the Kit Kat Club provide the groundwork for both the musical and his future novel.
The musical has long been a success both on the stage and screen, first hitting Broadway in 1966. before being turned into the 1972 film of the same name starring Oscar-winner Liza Minnelli as Sally. It was revived on Broadway in 1998 and in 2014, both with Alan Cumming as the Emcee.
A score, by Kander & Ebb, is made up of a string of songs that have become musical theater mainstays, like “Willkommen,” “Don’t Tell Mamma,” “Mein Herr,” “Two Ladies,” “Tomorrow Belongs to Me,” “Money,” “Maybe This Time” and, of course, “Cabaret.”
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The production also stars two-time Tony Award winner and 2024 Tony Award nominee Bebe Neuwirth, Calvin Leon Smith as ‘Clifford Bradshaw,’ 2024 Tony Award nominee Steven Skybell as ‘Herr Schultz;’ Henry Gottfried as ‘Ernst Ludwig,’ and Michelle Aravena as ‘Fritzie/Kost.’
Other stars in the cast include Gabi Campo as ‘Frenchie,’ Ayla Ciccone-Burton as ‘Helga,’ Colin Cunliffe as ‘Hans,’ Kayla Jenerson as ‘Rosie,’ Marty Lauter as ‘Victor,’ Loren Lester as ‘Herman/Max,’ David Merino as ‘Lulu,’ Julian Ramos as ‘Bobby,’ MiMi Scardulla as ‘Texas,’ and Paige Smallwood. Maya Bowles, Hannah Florence, Pedro Garza, Christian Kidd, Corinne Munsch, Chloé Nadon-Enriquez, and Karl Skyler Urban are swings.