Add another curveball to this unusual Broadway spring: a political comedy from a 28-year-old writer whose previous New York production took place in a 62-seat basement theater.
The new piece has a mouthful title — “POTUS: Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive” — and is a farce about a group of women conducting harm reductions for a troubled president.
Selina Fillinger, the playwright, is teaming up with Broadway veteran Susan Stroman, who will direct. The cast includes Julianne Hough, Vanessa Williams, Rachel Dratch, Lea DeLaria, Lilli Cooper, Suzy Nakamura and Julie White.
Previews are slated to begin on April 14, and the opening date has been set for May 9, which will most likely make it part of the next Broadway season, not the current one, if the Tony Awards stick to an expected late April opening deadline to kick off in. to qualify for this season’s prizes. The “POTUS” run, at the Shubert Theater, is limited and is expected to end on August 14.
Filllinger, an Oregon native who worked in Los Angeles as a writer for “The Morning Show,” said she started “POTUS” six years ago. (POTUS is an acronym for President of the United States.)
“For years we’ve had an endless series of headlines about powerful men abusing their power, and each time I was fascinated by the women circling the men and empowering them,” she said in an interview. “The more I started thinking about these women, the farce started writing itself.”
And is the show about a particular president, such as the last one?
“It’s an amalgamation of a lot of men in power,” she said. “I put it in the White House because that’s the highest office in the country, but you could put it in every company and every institution and in many homes.”
Filllinger’s previous work, “Something Clean,” was staged by Roundabout Underground in 2019 and was hailed by DailyExpertNews critic Ben Brantley as “a beautifully observed, richly compassionate new drama.”
Filllinger said there is a thematic overlap between “POTUS” and “Something Clean,” which was about a mother struggling with her son’s conviction for sexual assault. Her first play, ‘Faceless’, was about an American jihadist.
“I think I’m interested in complicity,” she said. “POTUS” and “Something Clean,” she noted, “are both aimed at someone who has never been seen on stage, and that’s because I’m interested in who we give airtime to and who we don’t give airtime to, and flipping the switch on it.”
Stroman, who has won five Tony Awards for choreography and direction in the past 30 years, including both categories for “The Producers,” is best known for musicals. This will be her first time performing a play on Broadway; Off Broadway, she directed a 2016 Colman Domingo drama, “Dot.”
In an interview, Stroman said an agent sent her the “POTUS” script and she was immediately interested. “It’s very funny, and it has an important message within the comedy. At some point, what it’s like to keep in power these people who aren’t worth it will be dealt with.”
The play’s lead producers are four companies: Seaview, led by Greg Nobile; 51 Entertainment, founded by Lynette Howell Taylor; Glass Half Full Productions, managed by Gareth Lake; and Level Forward, co-founded by Abigail Disney. According to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission, the production is allowed to fetch up to $6.75 million, but a spokeswoman said the actual capitalization of the piece would be $5.9 million.