The new musical Spring Awakening opened last night at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre, followed by a party at Tavern on the Green, where the show’s cast and creators were in a celebratory mood. Pictured here: (back row) Stephen Spinella and Jonathan Groff; (second row, from left) Remy Zaken, Lilli Cooper, Lea Michele, Phoebe Strole, Lauren Pritchard, Skylar Astin, and Jonathan B. Wright; (front row) playwright Steven Sater and John Gallagher, Jr.
Sater, director Michael Mayer (left) and composer Duncan Sheik (right) all had reason to smile, thanks to the show’s near-unanimous rave reviews.
Much credit for the show’s success belongs to its choreographer, modern dance legend Bill T. Jones.
Two generations of talent: Lilli Cooper, who plays the abused Martha, with her proud-as-can-be papa, Tony Award winner Chuck Cooper.
The opening brought out a large celebrity contingent, including handsome Peter Hermann — due on Broadway in February in Talk Radio — and his beautiful, Emmy Award-winning wife, Mariska Hargitay.
Also on hand: Hargitay’s Law & Order: SVU co-star B.D. Wong and multi-Emmy Award-winner Edie Falco…
…original Dreamgirls star Jennifer Holliday, who recently appeared at Ars Nova in a one-night-only performance of the new musical On, Girl, co-written by Steven Sater…
Long Island’s own Nicole Blonsky, who plays Tracy Turnblad in the film version of Hairspray…
…Grey Gardens‘ leading lady, Christine Ebersole, who will appear in the CBS-TV presentation of The Kennedy Center Honors on December 26, singing “As If We Never Said Goodbye” from Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Sunset Boulevard…
…the lovely Erika Christensen, who stars in the ABC-TV drama Six Degrees…
…R&B singer Freda Payne and the fabulous Leslie Kritzer, who will do two more shows of her critically acclaimed Patti LuPone tribute at Joe’s Pub in January before heading west for the San Francisco premiere of Legally Blonde…
…past Tony nominee Mary Stuart Masterson, soon to be seen onscreen in The Insurgents…
…Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tony Kushner…
…and Ian McShane, a recent Golden Globe Award winner for HBO’s Deadwood, who’s set to return to Broadway next year in a revival of Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming.
Finally, the honeymoon clearly isn’t over for Broadway newlyweds Christian Borle, who has left the cast of Spamalot to co-star in Legally Blonde, and Sutton Foster, who’s still knocking them dead nightly in The Drowsy Chaperone.
