Jake Gyllenhaal and Annaleigh Ashford, who both earned raves for their portrayals, will return to their roles, and will mark the second major Broadway revival of Sondheim and Lapine's Pulitzer Prize-winning musical.
Sondheim and Lapine's masterpiece follows painter Georges Seurat (Jake Gyllenhaal) in the months leading up to the completion of his most famous painting, A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. Consumed by his need to "finish the hat," Seurat alienates the French bourgeoisie, spurns his fellow artists, and neglects his lover Dot (Annaleigh Ashford), not realizing that his actions will reverberate over the next 100 years.
Sunday in the Park with George is produced on Broadway by Adam Speers for Ambassador Theatre Group, New York City Center, Jeanine Tesori, and Riva Marker.
Every once in a rare while, the theater rewards us with a kind of transcendent experience, a feeling that this, surely, will never happen again - at least not remotely in the same way. My once-in-a-lifetime theory is being crushed - exquisitely, rapturously - right now as Jake Gyllenhaal and Annaleigh Ashford step up alongside Mandy Patinkin and Bernadette Peters in the treasured place where I keep memories of the original 'Sunday in the Park With George.' They are that good.
Gyllenhaal is very good; so good, in fact, that we needn't say 'very good for a movie actor.' George-James Lapine and Stephen Sondheim's musicalized version of the pointillist painter Georges Seurat-is an introverted and anti-social fellow, who seems to only find comfort when he is at canvas or sketchpad. Gyllenhaal, while properly self-absorbedly as he perennially tries to 'finish the hat,' gives George an inner gleam of vulnerability and sensitivity which is sometimes overlooked in the role. (Hidden in the script is the comment that the women 'all wanted him and hated him at the same time.') Gyllenhaal shows us this inner layer, which has not always been visible in past productions, and properly carries it over to the 20th century George in Chicago.
1983 | Off-Broadway |
Playwrights Horizons Workshop Off-Broadway |
1984 | Broadway |
Original Broadway Production Broadway |
1986 | Regional (US) |
Long Beach Revival Regional (US) |
1990 | West End |
London Revival West End |
1994 | Broadway |
Reunion Concert Broadway |
1997 | Regional (US) |
Regional Revival Regional (US) |
2002 | Regional (US) |
Sondheim Festival Production Regional (US) |
2004 | Regional (US) |
Regional Concert Regional (US) |
2005 | London Fringe |
London Revival London Fringe |
2006 | West End |
West End Transfer West End |
2007 | Los Angeles |
Reprise! Concert Los Angeles |
2008 | Broadway |
Roundabout Revival Broadway |
2014 | Arlington, VA (Regional) |
Signature Theatre Production Arlington, VA (Regional) |
2016 | New York |
New York City Center Concert Gala New York |
2017 | Broadway |
Broadway Revival Broadway |
2020 | London |
2020 West End Revival London |
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