Nathan Lane Will Return to Broadway in \'The Nance\'

Lincoln Center Theater made it official on Wednesday and announced that it would present Nathan Lane in Douglas Carter Beane's play “The Nance,” marking Mr. Lane's return to Broadway after a two-year absence. Mr. Lane, a two-time Tony Award-winner, last appeared on Broadway in 2011 in “The Addams Family,” and said in June that the new play by Mr. Beane (the author of “The Little Dog Laughed” and book writer for “Xanadu” and “Lysistrata Jones”) would probably be his next project.

The title of “The Nance,” Lincoln Center Theater said, refers to a stock character in 1930s burlesque, a camp homosexual man often played by a heterosexual man; Chauncey Miles, the character portrayed by Mr. Lane, is a top nance performer who is gay. The theater company said in a news release that the play would mix drama and burlesque sketches to provide “the portrait of a homosexual man, living and working in the secretive and dangerous gay world of 1930's New York , whose outrageous antics on the burlesque stage stand in marked contrast to his messy offstage life.”

“The Nance” will be directed by Jack O'Brien (“Catch Me If You Can,” “Dead Accounts”) and presented at the Lyceum Theater. It it to begin previews on March 21 and its opening night is scheduled for April 15. The production will feature sets by John Lee Beatty, costumes by Ann Roth, lighting by Japhy Weideman and sound by Leon Rothenberg. Additional casting is expected to be announced later.