Grammy Award-winning opera singer Renée Fleming will make her Broadway debut this spring in a new play titled Living on Love, a comedy based on none other then an opera diva, according to The New York Times.
In Living on Love, Fleming will play opera singer Raquel De Angelis, whose conductor-husband starts to fall for a woman hired to ghostwrite his long-delayed autobiography. She retaliates by hiring her own ghostwriter but also gets romantically attached.
Fleming will only sing a little in the play, some improvised a cappella.
“I’ve spent my life singing tragic characters, so to be able to make people laugh is an extraordinary joy,” said Fleming.
Written by Tony Award winner Joe DiPietro (Memphis), Living is based on the play Peccadillo by Garson Kanin.
Living on Love was first mounted last summer at the Williamstown Theater Festival, where Fleming played a fretful opera diva opposite Douglas Sills as her hot-tempered husband, both of whom end up falling for their assistants.
The play will be directed by Tony winner Kathleen Marshall, who previously collaborated with DiPietro on the 2012 Broadway musical Nice Work if You Can Get It. The 18-week engagement of Living on Love is scheduled to begin April 1 at the Longacre Theater, where the current play revival of You Can’t Take It with You is scheduled to end its run Feb. 22.
Fleming will be staring in a new production of The Merry Widow at the Metropolitan Opera premiering Dec. 31. Currently, no other cast members for Living on Love have been announced.
