Kiefer Sutherland is set to make his Broadway debut alongside stage vets Chris Noth and Brian Cox in a revival of Jason Miller’s Tony- and Pulitzer Prize-winning play That Championship Season. Rounding out the cast will be comic actor Jim Gaffigan and playwright Miller's son, Jason Patric. Directed by Gregory Mosher,, the play will open in March 2011 at a Shubert theater to be announced. (An erroneous report from Deadline.com had indicated that Liev Schreiber would appear in the play.)
That Championship Season centers on a group of former high school basketball stars who return home for a reunion 20 years after they won the state championship. Cox will play the team’s coach; the four teammates will be played by Sutherland (James Daley), Gaffigan (George Sitkowski), Noth (Phil Romano) and Patric (Tom Daley).
The play began life at the Public Theater, where it opened on May 2, 1972. Transferring to Broadway’s Booth Theatre in September 1972, it ran for 700 performances and won both the Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize. The cast included Charles Durning as Sitkowski, Richard Dysart as Coach, Michael McGuire as James Daley, plus Walter McGinn as Tom Daley and Paul Sorvino in a Tony-nominated performance as Phil Romano. That Championship Season was revived at Second Stage in 1999. No other casting for the Broadway production has been announced.
Sutherland is best known for his Golden Globe-winning run as Jack Bauer in TV’s 24 and appeared onstage opposite his mother, Shirley Douglas, in The Glass Menagerie at the National Arts Centre. Cox has appeared on Broadway in Rock ‘n’ Roll, Art and Strange Interlude. Noth, known for his starring roles in TV's The Good Wife and Sex and the City, most recently appeared in the off-Broadway production of Farragut North. Patric played Brick opposite Ashley Judd in the Broadway revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and has appeared onstage in Bash, Beirut and Out of Gas, among others. Gaffigan is well known as the star of Comedy Central specials and as a comic actor and writer.
That Championship Season will be produced on Broadway by Robert Cole, Frederick Zollo and the Shubert Organization, who joined forced on last season's A Steady Rain.