Alan Menken and Jack Feldman Write New Song for NEWSIES National Tour

Tonight, the North American tour of Broadway's Tony® Award-winning smash hit musical, NEWSIES opens in Philadelphia. During its first year of touring in the 2014-15 season, the production will play 25 cities, over 43 weeks. Now according to Variety, the tour will feature a brand new song for 'Crutchie' from songwriting team Alan Menken and Jack Feldman. The duo created the song, titled "Letter from the Refuge," when Disney Theatrical Productions' Thomas Schumacher challenged them to add another tune as a part of the American Theater Wing series "Working in the Theater."

Menken told Variety: "Crutchie as a character would never be self-pitying, and he's not used to writing letters, so that defined the pace and the tone of the song. It's tentative, emotional but guarded, with a sense of false bravado and a tenderness underneath. For other songs in the show, for instance, I wanted to give 'Carrying the Banner' kind of a honkytonk feel, and 'Seize the Day' has a military sound. But this one is really just the music of the heart, so we wanted to keep it quiet and tender."

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The production features Dan DeLuca as "Jack Kelly", Steve Blanchard as "Joseph Pulitzer", Stephanie Styles as "Katherine", Angela Grovey as "Medda Larkin", Jacob Kemp as "Davey", Zachary Sayle as "Crutchie", and Vincent Crocilla and Anthony Rosenthal alternating the role of "Les." The company just met the press and BroadwayWorld was there for the big day. Go inside rehearsal with Richard Ridge below!

Rounding out the cast are Mark Aldrich, Josh Assor, Evan Autio, Bill Bateman, Joshua Michael Burrage, Kevin Carolan, DeMarius Copes, Benjamin Cook, Julian DeGuzman, Nico De Jesus, Sky Flaherty, Steve Greenstein, Jon Hacker, Jeff Heimbrock, Stephen Hernandez, James Judy, Meredith Inglesby, Eric John Mahlum, Ginna Claire Mason, Michael Ryan, Jordan Samuels, Jack Sippel, Melissa Steadman Hart, Andrew Wilson and Chaz Wolcott.

NEWSIES, the new American musical, features a Tony® Award-winning score with music by eight-time Academy Award® winner Alan Menken and lyrics by Jack Feldman, a book by four-time Tony® Award winner Harvey Fiersteinand is produced by Disney Theatrical Productions. NEWSIES is directed by Tony® nominee Jeff Calhoun and choreographed by Christopher Gattelli, who won a 2012 Tony Award® for his work. The entire creative team is reuniting to bring the break-out smash musical to audiences across North America.

Photo Credit: Walter McBride / WM Photos