Jessica Chastain is returning to Broadway with Lost Lear, a play written and directed by Irish theatermaker Dan Colley. The production will begin performances March 29, 2027, at the Booth Theatre, with an official opening night scheduled for April 23. Corey Stoll and Michael Urie will join Chastain in the sixteen-week engagement, according to the November 11 announcement and theater trade coverage.
Chastain will play Joy, a former actress living in a care home who believes she is back in rehearsals for King Lear. Stoll plays her son, Conor, and Urie plays Liam, a member of the care staff who responds to the world Joy experiences. The premise uses performance as a way for people to reach one another when ordinary conversation has become difficult.
Sophia Rubino’s November 11 Broadway.com report and Gillian Russo’s New York Theatre Guide article are reference coverage for the casting and dates. BroadwayWorld also published the production announcement. The announcement brings together three actors whose careers span stage and screen, with additional casting to follow. It also places a specific new production on the spring calendar, rather than simply signaling an intention to return to Broadway at some undetermined point.
A stage return with an unusual central role
Chastain’s previous Broadway appearances include The Heiress in 2012 and the 2023 revival of A Doll’s House. Her performance in the latter earned a Tony nomination. Lost Lear therefore marks a return to a medium she has already worked in, while presenting a different dramatic situation from either earlier production. The new role places an actress’s relationship with performance inside the story itself, allowing the audience to watch both the person and the remembered role shape what happens on stage.
That creates an intriguing challenge. Joy is not simply remembering a role while remaining entirely in the present. The announced premise allows the rehearsal to become the reality through which she interprets what is happening around her. An actor playing that situation has to make the character’s experience legible to the audience without reducing her to a device that explains the plot.
The other performers face a related challenge. They need to communicate their characters’ immediate intentions while also responding to the reality Joy inhabits. The audience may understand something about an encounter that Joy understands differently. That gap can create tenderness, frustration or humor depending on how it is staged. It is a rich theatrical setup, though the production’s eventual effect can only be assessed after it is performed.
Why King Lear offers a recognizable frame
Lost Lear draws on Shakespeare without being a straightforward revival of the original play. The title and premise point toward questions of recognition, family and the difficulty of being heard. A viewer does not need to memorize Shakespeare’s language to understand why a visit between a mother and son might carry unfinished business. The new play supplies its own characters and immediate circumstances.
The rehearsal setting adds another useful idea. In rehearsal, people repeat moments because they are trying to discover what they mean and how to communicate them. A line can sound different when the listener changes. An action can acquire another purpose when the performer understands more about the scene. Those qualities make rehearsal a productive setting for a story about memory and a conversation people have struggled to complete.
For theatergoers familiar with King Lear, references may create an additional layer. For newcomers, the human problem can remain the entry point. The best introduction is the published premise itself: a performer believes she is rehearsing, a caregiver joins that experience, and a son must decide how to meet his mother within it. That is enough to begin without turning an evening at the theater into a literature examination.
A play with a history before Broadway
The production comes with an established development history. Theater coverage traces Lost Lear to the Dublin Theatre Festival in 2022 and subsequent international engagements. It won a Scotsman Fringe First Award at the 2025 Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Colley will direct the Broadway production himself, bringing the work to New York after its earlier life rather than handing an untested concept directly to a large commercial stage.
The announced design team includes Scott Pask for production design, Heather Gilbert for lighting, Cody Spencer for sound, and Hana S Kim and Yana Biryukova for projections. Daniel McAuley provides original music. Those disciplines are particularly relevant to a play that may need to shift an audience’s sense of place or time without interrupting the performers’ connection.
In theater, a change in light or sound can establish a new relationship to a room even when the physical scenery remains in place. Projection can add information, but it can also compete with an actor if it becomes the only thing an audience watches. The interesting design question for this premise is how the production makes Joy’s experience understandable while preserving the live encounter at its center.
What the limited engagement means for audiences
The cast’s experience offers another point of interest. Stoll’s stage work includes Appropriate, while Urie’s Broadway credits include Spamalot and Once Upon a Mattress. Those productions call on different performance skills, but each involves responding to an audience in real time and sustaining a character across a complete evening. Lost Lear will bring that live experience into a concentrated dramatic relationship. The most revealing moments may be the exchanges between the three leads, where a change of attention can alter what an audience understands about the people in the room.
The March 29 first performance and April 23 opening are different milestones. The period before opening allows a production to perform for paying audiences while continuing the work that leads to its formal opening. People choosing dates should understand that distinction rather than assume the first preview and opening night are interchangeable terms.
A sixteen-week run also creates a defined planning window. Fans traveling to New York for a particular performer can check the official production site for the current schedule and any performance exceptions. Ticket prices, policies and availability can change, so the announced engagement should be the starting point for planning rather than a substitute for checking the date being purchased.
The immediate attraction is a substantial new role for Chastain alongside two actors with extensive stage experience. The deeper interest is the form of the story: a play in which entering someone else’s scene may become the only way to communicate. Lost Lear is scheduled to bring that idea to the Booth Theatre next spring, giving Broadway audiences a chance to encounter a work whose journey began well before its newly announced New York engagement.
References and reporting credit
Reference article Sophia Rubino for Broadway.com. Jessica Chastain to Return to Broadway in Lost Lear Also Starring Corey Stoll and Michael Urie. November 11 2026.
Reference article Gillian Russo for New York Theatre Guide. Jessica Chastain Corey Stoll Michael Urie to star in new play Lost Lear on Broadway this spring. November 11 2026.
Production announcement coverage BroadwayWorld. Jessica Chastain Michael Urie and Corey Stoll Will Lead Lost Lear on Broadway. November 11 2026.
Official production site Lost Lear. Lost Lear on Broadway. Current page checked November 12 2026.
