NEW YORK - Joey Evans, the womanizing title character of "Pal Joey," is getting ready for a return to Broadway, played this time around by Tony winner Christian Hoff.
The classic 1940 Richard Rodgers-Lorenz Hart musical will also star Stockard Channing as wealthy socialite Vera Simpson and Martha Plimpton as scheming blackmailer Gladys Bumps. The Roundabout Theatre Company production will open Dec. 11 at Studio 54, with previews beginning Nov. 14.
No word yet on who will sing "Zip," the striptease parody memorably recreated in the show's successful 1952 revival by Elaine Stritch. The score also features such Rodgers and Hart standards as "Bewitched (Bothered and Bewildered)," "I Could Write a Book" and "You Mustn't Kick It Around." A song cut from the original, "I'm Talking to My Pal," will be included in the new production.
Joe Mantello will direct the Roundabout revival, which will have choreography by Graciela Daniele. The original book by John O'Hara has been redone by Richard Greenberg, author of such plays as "Take Me Out" and "Three Days of Rain."
Hoff won a Tony Award for his portrayal of Tommy DeVito in "Jersey Boys." Channing has been seen in such plays as "Six Degrees of Separation," "The Lion in Winter" and "House of Blue Leaves," and in the television series "The West Wing," in which she played first lady Abby Bartlet.
"Pal Joey" is based on a series of short stories O'Hara wrote for The New Yorker about an opportunistic down-on-his-luck hoofer whose specialty is using people to get what he wants.
The original 1940 production starred Gene Kelly and Vivienne Segal. Some critics sniffed at its cynical, unsentimental outlook, but by the time of its first Broadway revival in 1952 (which starred Segal and Harold Lang) the show was an even bigger hit.
The musical's last New York appearance was a 1995 "Encores!" concert version starring Patti LuPone and Peter Gallagher.
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