(© David Gordon)
In the musical, which follows a dysfunctional family as they travel in a broken-down Volkswagen bus to a children’s beauty pageant, Tony Award-nominee O’Malley will play heartbroken Proust scholar Frank Hoover alongside Rasche as foul-mouthed Grandpa Hoover, Rowland as the silent Dwayne Hoover, and Taylor as Joshua Rose, Frank’s ex-lover. Josh Lamon (Into the Woods) and Jennifer Sanchez (West Side Story) will play Buddy and Miss California, the hosts of the “Little Miss Sunshine” pageant.
As previously announced , the production, featuring a score by Finn and a book and direction by Lapine, will star Hannah Rose Nordberg as Olive Hoover, as well as Tony nominees Stephanie J. Block and Will Chase as Olive’s parents, Sheryl and Richard Hoover.
Little Miss Sunshine premiered at the La Jolla Playhouse in 2011 and follows the down-on-their-luck Hoover family as they travel 800 miles in a Volkswagen bus to a children’s beauty pageant so that youngest daughter Olive can participate. The 2006 film version, which starred Greg Kinnear, Toni Collette, Abigail Breslin, and Alan Arkin, received an Oscar nomination for Best Picture and won two awards, for Arkin’s performance as the crass grandfather and for Michael Arndt’s screenplay.
Finn and Lapine have previously collaborated on the acclaimed musicals Falsettos and The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, which Second Stage premiered in 2005 before moving to Broadway later that year.
The show will kick off Second Stage’s 35th anniversary season on October 15 with an opening night to be determined.
Click here for more information and tickets to Little Miss Sunshine.
