It's Official: On Golden Pond to Shutter on June 26

On Golden Pond is now officially set to close on Sunday, June 26 after 19 previews and 93 regular performances at the Cort Theatre.

As previously reported, producers put up a provisional closing notice on June 21 because it was unknown when star James Earl Jones, who is suffering from pneumonia, would be able to return to the show. Today doctors determined that his recuperation would prevent his return until sometime in August.

Jones, a well known stage and screen actor who earned mostly rave reviews for his portrayal of Normal Thayer Jr. in On Golden Pond, was the main attraction of this revival. Without his presence, the show took a significant hit at the box office. Last week when Jones missed seven of eight performances the production was down $54,642 as compared to the previous week when Jones missed only one performance to come in at $162,053.

After tryouts at the Kennedy Center and Delaware's DuPont Theatre, this production of Ernest Thompson's On Golden Pond, directed by Leonard Foglia and headlined by Jones and Leslie Uggams, opened at the Cort on April 7 to mixed reviews. In his Broadway.com Review of the play, Edward Karam wrote: "On Golden Pond doesn't bear close scrutiny. It works only when the genius or charisma of its stars, irrespective of fame, can blind an audience to its shortcomings. Frances Sternhagen and Tom Aldredge apparently made it soar in the original outing, and on film Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn charmed their way to Oscars. Despite its two name stars, James Earl Jones and Leslie Uggams, there's little of such chemistry in Leonard Foglia's production… On Golden Pond, to its credit, is one of the rare plays to focus on the elderly, but as a dramatic meal it's more cornflakes than sirloin."

In addition to Jones and Uggams, Linda Powell, Alexander Mitchell, Peter Francis James and Craig Bockhorn star.