Ed Asner Returns to Broadway After 23 Years in ‘Grace’

Ed Asner is returning to Broadway for the first time in 23 years.

The 82-year-old actor has joined the cast of Grace, a play starring Paul Rudd and Michael Shannon, show producers announced Monday.

Earlier, THR confirmed the casting with a source close to Asner.

The Broadway production of Craig Wright‘s dark comedy will begin previews Sept. 14, with actress Kate Arrington completing the four-person cast. Opening night is scheduled for Oct. 4 at a theater to be announced.

Rudd will portray a religious idealist who aims to open a chain of Gospel motels in Florida and moves in next door to Shannon’s cynical character; Asner will play an abrasive exterminator in the Dexter Bullard-directed production.

Grace, which has been staged regionally but will premiere in New York in an updated version, marks Wright’s debut as a playwright on the Great White Way. He was previously a staff writer on HBO’s Six Feet Under, and a writer and producer on ABC’s Lost and Brothers & Sisters.

Shannon had an Off Broadway hit in 2010 with Wright’s play Mistakes Were Made, also directed by Bullard. Rudd’s last appearance on Broadway was in 2006, opposite Julia Roberts and Bradley Cooper in Three Days of Rain.

Asner, whose prolific acting credits include his memorable role as Lou Grant in The Mary Tyler Moore Show, last graced the Broadway stage in a 1989 revival of Born Yesterday. He has also starred in productions of Threepenny Opera and Face of a Hero.

Asner is repped by Greene and Associates.

Lead producers of Grace on Broadway are Debbie Bisno, Fox Theatricals and Paula Wagner.