Spooky 'Addams Family' to sing

Posted October 30, 2008 11:00 pm

By Scott C. Morgan

Charles Addams' creepy and kooky comic characters known as "The Addams Family" are set to sing in a new musical. Starting in November 2009, "The Addams Family" has its pre-Broadway world premiere in Chicago at the Ford Center for the Performing Arts, Oriental Theatre.

Best known for the popular 1960s TV show and big-screen adaptations in the 1990s, "The Addams Family" first shot to fame starting in the 1930s as a series of cartoons in The New Yorker.

For the musical adaptation, "Addams Family" producers Roy Furman with Chicago-based Elephant Eye Theatrical have assembled a creative team that includes composer/lyricist Andrew Lippa ("The Wild Party"), playwrights Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice ("Jersey Boys," "Turn of the Century") and British co-directors and designers Julian Crouch and Phelim McDermott ("Shockheaded Peter," "Satyagraha" at the Metropolitan Opera).

Although no casting has been announced, Emmy and Tony Award-winners Nathan Lane ("The Producers," "The Birdcage") and Bebe Newirth ("Chicago," "Cheers") have participated in workshop readings of the musical.

The creepy "Addams Family" clan will sing when a Broadway-bound musical based upon Charles Addams' creepy characters tries out in Chicago next year at the Ford Center for the Performing Arts, Oriental Theatre.

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