Bradley Cooper and Patricia Clarkson will head the cast of The Elephant Man when the 1977 drama by Bernard Pomerance returns to Broadway this coming fall.
Scheduled to run at the Shubert Theatre with exact dates yet to be announced, the Tony-winning play will be directed by Scott Ellis and produced by James L. Nederlander.
Much of the cast including Clarkson (as Mrs. Kendal), Cooper (as John Merrick) and Alessandro Nivola (as Dr. Fredrik Treves) appeared together in the 2012 Williamstown Theater Festival production of the play, which was also staged by Ellis.
The classic tale of a disfigured man who went from a Victorian London freak show to English high society has drawn audiences for over a century. John Hurt starred in David Lynch‘s 1980 film version, which earned eight Oscar nominations — including best picture, director, adapted screenplay and actor — but ultimately no wins.
The Elephant Man has long been a passion project for Cooper, who played the role as part of his senior thesis at the Actors Studio Drama School. He last appeared on Broadway in 2006, opposite Julia Roberts and Paul Rudd in Richard Greenberg‘s Three Days of Rain.
Clarkson has been absent from Broadway since 1989 when she starred in Eastern Standard, also by Greenberg, while Nivola appeared last fall in the revival of Terence Rattigan‘s The Winslow Boy.
Cooper and Nivola are currently on screen together in American Hustle, which is nominated for ten Oscars, including best supporting actor for Cooper.
