Can Broadway audiences “handle the truth”? It looks like they’ll get a chance next season. Aaron Sorkin’s A Few Good Men is aiming to return to Broadway during the 2010-2011 season, producer Ken Davenport told The New York Times. The production, which is looking for a high-profile actor for the leading role, will be directed by David Esbjornson.
“A Few Good Men asks the difficult question of how far we’re willing to let our military go to protect our freedom,” Davenport told the Times. “That’s never been more relevant than today, especially for a play that deals with Guantanamo Bay.”
Emmy-winning scribe Sorkin, celebrated for The West Wing, Sports Night and Charlie Wilson’s War has one other Broadway credit: The Farnsworth Invention in 2007. Sorkin will rework the A Few Good Men for the Broadway revival.
“I’m thrilled that A Few Good Men could be headed back to Broadway,” Sorkin told the Times. “While I’m very proud of the play and the success the original production enjoyed, I wrote it when I was much younger and it’s always felt a little to me like looking at my high school yearbook picture so I’m particularly excited about the idea of being able to go back into rehearsal, do some rewriting and help make this the best production of the play that’s ever been seen.”
Names like James Franco and Justin Timberlake were bandied about as examples of the level of star desired for the leading role of Lt. Daniel Kaffee, a Navy lawyer investigating a murder of a Marine by other Marines at Gitmo. The part was originated on Broadway by Tom Hulce in 1989 and played in the 1992 film version by Tom Cruise. No casting for the Broadway revival has been confirmed.