Texas Performing Arts Turns Up the 2026-2027 Touring Season Volume Up to Eleven

 

by Brian Paul Scipione, CTXLiveTheatre

Texas Performing Arts held its third annual preview night for the upcoming Broadway in Austin 2026-2027 season on March 9. The headline news is that with eleven shows scheduled, this is going to be their biggest season ever. It includes classic favorites and new critical hits having their Austin premieres. Those shows were revealed slowly throughout the evening to raucous applause, but I’m going to list them all up front (unlike those annoying clickbait articles that proliferate through our electronic world).

 

·      Mrs. Doubtfire

·      A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical

·      Buena Vista Social Club™

·      Alicia Keys’ Hell’s Kitchen

·      Water For Elephants

·      Death Becomes Her

·      Harry Potter and the Cursed Child

·      The Phantom of the Oprea

·      Waitress

·      Beetlejuice

·      The Book of Mormon

 

The Book of Mormon and The Phantom of the Opera need no introductions, both being among the top five best-selling musicals of all time. Mrs. Doubtfire, Water for Elephants, Death Becomes Her, Waitress, and Beetlejuice are all adaptions of popular movies or novels of the same name. Death Becomes Her is a standout because it is known for its mind-boggling on-stage illusions. 

 

 

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is a two-act play and the only non-musical production in the lineup. It is based on a new story from the Harry Potter Universe written by Jack Thorne, J. K. Rowling, and John Tiffany. The storycenters around the sons of Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy sons and their struggles to live up to their fathers' legacies.

 

Finally, A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical, Buena Vista Social Club™, and Alicia Keys’ Hell’s Kitchen are musical biopics. A Beautiful Noise is a jukebox musical based on the life of Neil Diamond featuring his greatest hits. Buena Vista Social Club™ is set in Havana, Cuba and features all the original Spanish-language songs of the eponymous LP, telling the story of four musicians as their lives change from the 1950s to the 1990s. Hell’s Kitchen uses a combination of Keys’ hits and new songs written for the production to tell the story of 17-year-old Ali, a character inspired by Keys’ own life.

 

The preview evening had the energy of a pep rally and opened with a rousing Broadway medley including: “There's No Business Like Show Business,” “Puttin' on the Ritz,” and “On Broadway,” performed by a select ensemble of incredibly talented Texas high school theater students. They closed the evening with an equally ferocious song and dance routine.

Lauren Reid, president of the John Gore Organization, and TPA Executive & Artistic Director Bob Bursey hosted. The audience was also treated to performances by cast members of A Beautiful Noise, Hell’s Kitchen, and Death Becomes Her. Another highlight was Austin’s own Natalia Luna, director of dance at Lamar Middle School, honored with the TPA Educator of the Year award. That was a great reminder that the path to the Broadway spotlight begins with incredible teachers who foster the future of talent.

 

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