Kevin Kline, one of the most gifted stage actors of his generation, is notorious for being choosy about his roles. However, the actor who long ago earned the nickname of “Kevin Decline” recently met an offer he couldn’t refuse.Producer Jordan Roth recently announced that Kline would make his first Broadway appearance in almost a decade in Noel Coward’s 1942 comedy “Present Laughter.” In this deliriously witty classic, Kline will play narcissistic Gary Essendine, a matinee idol pursued by women, stalked by a young playwright, and balancing the demands of his ex-wife and long-suffering secretary. The present crisis in “Present Laughter” is that Essendine is turning, gasp, 40 years old!Coward himself created the role and it has since attracted a roster of great actors including Albert Finney, Peter O’Toole, Ian McKellan, Frank Langella - who played Essendine on Broadway in 1998 - and Victor Garber who assayed him for the Roundabout in 2010.A protégée of John Houseman, Kline, 68, has proved protean, excelling equally at drama, musicals and comedy. He won Tony Awards for “On the Twentieth Century,” which first brought him acclaim in 1978; and “Pirates of Penzance,” which furthered his reputation as an actor who could virtually do anything. Hollywood beckoned in 1982, with notable roles in “Sophie’s Choice,” “The Big Chill,” and “Silverado.” But it was as Otto “Don’t-call-me-stupid!” West in “A Fish Called Wanda” that Kline capped his film career with an Oscar win in 1988.Since then, both film and stage appearances have been relatively spare. His last Broadway outing was in the title role of “Cyrano de Bergerac” in 2007, a follow-up to his Tony-nominated performance as Sir John Falstaff in “Henry IV.” Sir John and Gary Essendine are both vainglorious - as is Otto in “Fish” - so “Present Laughter” seems the perfect vehicle for a Kline return. Furthermore, the zany comedy will be directed by Moritz von Stuelpnagel, whose previous assignment, handling the pyrotechnics in “Hand to God,” earned him a Tony nomination.“In our fame and social media-obsessed age, it feels especially à propos to do a sex farce about being a celebrity,” said von Stuelpnagel of the comedy that was first produced on Broadway in 1948 and has since been revived four times. He added, “We all curate a kind of façade, a public face, but when the laughs and the parties end, I think we’re left with something darker and deeply human: ourselves, private, true.”“Present Laughter” is scheduled to open on Wednesday, April 5, following a three-week preview period, beginning March 14. While the producers noted in a press release that it would be a strictly limited engagement, they did not provide a closing date. It will play the St. James Theatre, whose present occupant is “Something Rotten!” which will close on January 1. The highly-anticipated stage adaptation of “Frozen” will follow “Present Laughter” into the theater in the Spring of 2018 and there will be some re-construction of the theater to accommodate the musical which is likely to be a blockbuster.
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