Midnight In The Garden of Good and Evil - Broadway?

Is it still coming in this year as originally teased? Does anyone know the latest?

Producers are still aiming for this season. Whether they can get the proper funding and a theater is the question. In an ideal world, I feel like this is a show that should open early fall so it has more breathing room to establish itself before the scene is flooded with new musicals in the spring. Then again, given the current financial market, we may not see as many new musicals debut this season, so perhaps the spring won't feel as jam packed as in previous years. In either case, this doesn't feel like a mass-appeal type of show, so it likely has an uphill battle no matter when it opens.

ErmengardeStopSniveling said: "The problem with an early fall opening is the show has to survive eight months till the Tonys. If it gets MAYBE HAPPY ENDING level reviews that helps it (but doesn’t guarantee financial success). If it gets LEMPICKA level reviews that means it’s gone before Valentines Day.

I realize conventional wisdom is to open in the spring so you don't have to tough out the winter months. And I'm sure that still makes sense. But last season it seems like the shows that opened in April were hurt because the narrative has already solidified and Real Women and Outlaw just couldn't get any traction/ have enough time to build WOM. At least that's how some perceive what happened, so I'm seeing more and more people wish shows would open in the fall (even though that goes against conventional wisdom).

Historically, the spring has been a better period to open in if you're chasing Best Musical due to the voters' perceived "recency bias." However, the majority of best Musical winners this decade have opened outside of April.

Last year, the Best Musical lineup was already decided before April got here. Maybe Happy Ending and Death Becomes Her opened in the fall and solidified their status as contenders. They didn't have as much competition opening around them, and voters were able to sit with their viewing experiences of these musicals for many months. Buena Vista and Mincemeat opened in March, later in the season, but still avoiding the mad rush at the end of April. All four shows are wildly different in style and themes. That left one slot open and it went to Dead Outlaw, because voters were likely already familiar with it from downtown, and due to the pedigree of the writers.

Boop, Smash, Old Friends, Just in Time, and Real Women Have Curves all tried to come in right at the end of the season and score that final Best Musical slot. All of them were screwed from the start. And the only one of those shows still kicking is the one led by a major Broadway name. Opening at the end of the season is no longer a way to guarantee a Best Musical nomination. How was Real Women supposed to build up consensus? Nominators saw it once, in the very busy last week of eligibility, and then had to vote a few days later. It's a tall order for any musical to come in that late and say "this is one of the 5 best of the season" when nominators have been secure in their thoughts about a bunch of other quality musicals for months.

I'm very excited for Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. But it is a very tough sell for commercial Broadway. And I maintain that opening in the fall, with a really captivating marketing strategy, would be their best bet at both a Best Musical nomination and long-term survival. This is a show that needs breathing room to establish itself. If they open at the end of April, it will absolutely be gone by July.

Opening in April is more about survival, IMO. A new musical opening in the fall has to have confidence (and, hopefully, $$$) to last 6-8 months including through winter, Broadway’s toughest period of the year. It’s doable. But not every show can survive an early opening.

The Tony nominating committee has demonstrated that they aren’t too swayed by recency, which is great, though if a show is closed it makes it hard to crack Best Musical. (I maintain that Hal Luftig’s HERE LIES LOVE could have had a better run with awards and audiences by opening in the springtime.)

Knowing someone who is a producer on the show, don’t expect anything soon. With Ghee doing Saturday Church Off Broadway and however those prospects turn out for a future run, this show may be dead in the water as Ghee as their biggest star on deck.

The reviews in Chicago were mixed, leaning negative. From what I remember, the consensus was that by putting so much focus on the supporting role of Lady Chablis (G. Harrison Ghee), the main storyline of Jim Williams became secondary and the whole show was too much of a hodgepodge. I think they were trying to capitalize on our newfound celebratory attitude towards transness (as well as Ghee’s recent Tony win), and ended up telling too many stories at once. I have actually been slowly making my way through the book, and although I understand the temptation to make the musical adaption a tapestry of characters, based on the reviews anyway, that was not the best choice.

If they’re going to keep the focus on Chablis they’ll have to write her a proper story and character arc. In Chicago we just had two+ hours of her telling us how fabulous she was. She could have been the Velma to Jim’s Roxie. But they rarely interacted. The book kept her in a separate show.


The film found a way to get her in the court room.

Updated On: 7/24/25 at 10:12 AM