Opening night for On Your Feet: The Story of Emilio & Gloria Estefan, the new musical based on the life of pop/Latin crossover singer Gloria Estefan and her husband, has been announced. The show will be touching down on Broadway on October 5, 2015 for a month of previews leading up to a November 5, 2015 opening, following a world premiere engagement at Chicago's Oriental Theatre June 2 - July 5, 2015.
Two-time Tony Award winner Jerry Mitchell (Kinky Boots, Hairspray, La Cage Aux Folles, Legally Blonde) will direct a cast to be selected partly through audition videos submitted via a website. (Whether the producers--Bernie Yuman, James L. Nederlander and Estefan Enterprises Inc.--will also feel the need to raise funds online is another question.) There will also be open casting calls next month, one in New York on September 9, 2014 and another in the Estefans' home town of Miami on September 21.
Emilio Estefan (music and lyrics), not only the singer's husband but her lifelong musical collaborator, says, "This is a real story about two immigrants that came to the States looking for freedom." Adds Executive Producer Bernie Yuman, "What made me want to bring the Estefans' story to Broadway is that it's literally living the American dream."
The show will feature many of Estefan's biggest hits, such as "1-2-3," "Rhythm Is Gonna Get You," "Conga" and "Mi Tierra," plus new music written by the Estefans. The book is by two-time Drama Desk nominee Alexander Dinelaris (The Bodyguard Musical, currently on the West End; Zanna Don't!). The choreographer is four-time Drama Desk nominee Sergio Trujillo (Jersey Boys, Memphis, Next to Normal, The Addams Family).
On Your Feet may be a jukebox musical, but there's real drama to the Estefans' story, and not just band drama. "There's a love story, a very real one," says the singer, and an "against-all-odds" story. "They even told [Emilio] once, Get rid of the girl singer. Thank God he didn't."
And of course there was the crash that nearly ended Gloria Estefan's career. Says the singer, "When I got back on the road after I had broken my back and they had told me that I would probably never walk again, music was the biggest thing that got us through."
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