Breaking: Brandon Uranowitz, James Synder & More Will Lead Encores! GRAND HOTEL!

Encores! Artistic Director Jack Viertel today announced casting for the Encores! production of Grand Hotel, The Musical, directed and choreographed by Josh Rhodes.

The Tony Award-winning musical that follows the post-war comings and goings at Berlin's most prestigious hotel will star Junior Cervila, John Clay III, Natascia Diaz, John Dossett, Irina Dvorovenko, Guadalupe Garcia, Nehal Joshi, James T. Lane, Jamie LaVerdiere, Eric Leviton, Robert Montano, Kevin Pariseau, William Ryall, James Snyder, Stephanie Styles, Brandon Uranowitz, and Daniel Yearwood.

The ensemble includes Aaron J. Albano, Matt Bauman, Kate Chapman, Sara Esty, Hannah Florence, Richard Gatta, Emily Kelly, Andrew Kruep, Kelly Methven, Harris Milgrim, Adam Roberts, Christopher Trepinski, and Sharrod Williams.

Inspired by Vicki Baum's 1929 novel, Grand Hotel, The Musical intertwines the lives of a cast of eccentric characters through a series of fateful encounters. Whirling through the doors of the opulent Grand Hotel are faded ballerina Elizaveta Grushinskaya (Irina Dvorovenko); the impoverished romantic Baron Felix von Gaigern (James Snyder); fatally ill bookkeeper Otto Kringelein (Brandon Uranowitz); and Flaemmchen (Stephanie Styles), a young secretary who is all too eager to become an American film star. Originally produced under the title At the Grand (1958), with a score by Robert Wright and George Forrest and book by Luther Davis, the production was revitalized in 1989 by director-choreographer Tommy Tune, with additional music and lyrics by Maury Yeston, for a Tony Award-winning run on Broadway.

The Encores! production, directed and choreographed by Josh Rhodes, will feature music direction by Encores! Music Director Rob Berman. Grand Hotel, The Musical will run for seven performances at New York City Center from March 21 - 25. The Encores! at 25 season concludes with Me and My Girl (May 9 - 13).

The 2018 Encores! season is made possible by Roz and Jerry Meyer, Stacey and Eric Mindich, Nathalie and Pablo Salame, The Shubert Foundation, and the Stephanie and Fred Shuman Fund for Encores!

Grand Hotel, The Musical

Mar 21 - 25, 2018

Wed & Thu at 7:30pm, Fri at 8pm, Sat at 2 & 8pm, Sun at 2 & 7pm

Book by Luther Davis

Music and Lyrics by Robert Wright and George Forrest

Based on Vicki Baum's Grand Hotel

By arrangement with Turner Broadcasting Co., owner of the motion picture Grand Hotel

Additional Music and Lyrics by Maury Yeston

Featuring The Encores! Orchestra

Music Director Rob Berman

Directed and Choreographed by Josh Rhodes

Josh Rhodes (Director & Choreographer) directed Evita (Asolo Rep), Guys and Dolls (Asolo Rep and The Old Globe), Spamalot (5th Avenue Theatre), Ken Ludwig's play Baskerville (Old Globe Theatre), Ebenezer Scrooge's Big Playhouse Christmas Show (Bucks County Playhouse), and Celestina Warbeck and the Banshees in Diagon Alley at The Wizarding World Of Harry Potter. On Broadway, he choreographed Rodgers + Hammerstein's Cinderella, It Shoulda Been You, First Date, and Bright Star. On London's West End, he choreographed Carousel at the English National Opera and Sweeney Todd starring Emma Thompson. Other credits include Company starring Neil Patrick Harris (PBS), Sondheim: The Birthday Concert (PBS), Broadway: Three Generations (Kennedy Center), Elf and 1776 (Papermill Playhouse), and Young Frankenstein (The Muny). Mr. Rhodes is excited to return to Encores! after choreographing Zorba and Big River.

Rob Berman (Encores! Music Director) is in his 11th season as music director of Encores! for which he has conducted close to 30 productions and four cast recordings. Berman's Broadway credits include Bright Star, Tuck Everlasting, Dames at Sea, Finian's

Rainbow, Irving Berlin's White Christmas, The Pajama Game, The Apple Tree, Wonderful Town, and Promises, Promises.

For nine years he was music director of the Kennedy Center Honors on CBS, for which he won an Emmy Award for outstanding musical direction. He has conducted for Barbara Cook with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and he was also music director for the PBS presentation of A Broadway Celebration: In Performance at the White House. Other credits include Sunday in the Park with George (Kennedy Center, Helen Hayes Award), Pacific Overtures, and Passion (Classic Stage Company). Recordings include the complete restored score of Jerome Kern's Roberta for New World Records.

New York City Center (Arlene Shuler, President & CEO) has played a defining role in the cultural life of the city since 1943. For 25 years, City Center's Tony-honored Encores! series has been "an essential New York institution" (The New York Times). In 2013, City Center launched the Encores! Off-Center series, which features seminal Off-Broadway musicals filtered through the lens of today's innovative artists. Dance has also been integral to the theater's mission from the start and programs like the annual Fall for Dance Festival remain central to City Center's identity. Home to a roster of renowned national and international companies including Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (City Center's Principal Dance Company) and Manhattan Theatre Club, New York City Center was Manhattan's first performing arts center, founded with the mission of making the best in music, theater, and dance accessible to all audiences. That mission continues today through robust education and community engagement programs which bring the performing arts to over 9,000 New York City students each year and the expansion of the theatrical experience to include art exhibitions, pre-show talks, and master classes that offer an up-close look at the work of the great theater and dance artists of our time. NYCityCenter.org