Lincoln Center Theater Looks to the Canon, the Future, and a Little Broadway Thunder
Under Lear deBessonet, Lincoln Center Theater’s next season appears to be making a clear argument: the American stage can honor its great inheritances while still leaving the door open for new voices, new forms and the occasional star-powered jolt.
The institution has announced its 2026-2027 season, the second under deBessonet’s leadership as Kewsong Lee Artistic Director, with productions planned across the Vivian Beaumont, Mitzi E. Newhouse and Claire Tow theaters. The lineup includes a first Broadway revival of Aaron Sorkin’s “A Few Good Men,” a return of “The Sound of Music,” a revival of August Wilson’s “Seven Guitars,” new plays by Kimberly Belflower, Mfoniso Udofia and Emma Watkins, and a set of special events featuring Sara Bareilles, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Benj Pasek & Justin Paul.
It is, in other words, a season that seems designed to speak to several audiences at once: the subscriber who wants Rodgers & Hammerstein, the political theatergoer who still hears the echo of “you can’t handle the truth,” the August Wilson faithful, the new-play crowd, and the musical theater obsessive who will show up anywhere Lin-Manuel Miranda might discuss craft.
At the Vivian Beaumont, the season begins with “A Few Good Men,” Sorkin’s 1989 courtroom drama, directed by six-time Tony Award winner Michael Arden and starring Bradley Whitford and Tom Blyth, who will make his Broadway debut. Performances begin on October 8, 2026, with opening night on October 29, for a 13-week engagement. The play, best known to many through its film adaptation, returns to Broadway with its familiar questions about loyalty, secrecy, power, and conscience newly sharpened for the present moment.
In spring 2027, deBessonet will direct “The Sound of Music,” the first Broadway revival of the Rodgers & Hammerstein musical in nearly 30 years. Jasmine Amy Rogers will star as Maria, with choreography by Christopher Gattelli. Performances begin March 23, 2027, ahead of an April 15 opening, for a 17-week run. The production arrives after deBessonet’s “Ragtime” became a major success for Lincoln Center Theater, playing to sold-out houses, earning major awards and attention, and helping define her first full season.
Off-Broadway, the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater will open its season with the previously announced “The Whoopi Monologues,” a reimagining of Whoopi Goldberg’s landmark solo work, directed by Whitney White and featuring Dominique Fishback, Kecia Lewis, Danielle Pinnock, Kerry Washington and Kara Young. The season continues with August Wilson’s “Seven Guitars,” directed by Ruben Santiago-Hudson, followed by “Playing Burton,” Mark Jenkins’s play about Richard Burton, starring Matthew Rhys and directed by Bartlett Sher. The Newhouse season will close with the world premiere of Kimberly Belflower’s “Born in the Dirt,” directed by Danya Taymor, reuniting the playwright and director after the Broadway success of “John Proctor is the Villain.”
At LCT3’s Claire Tow Theater, artistic director Maria Manuela Goyanes has programmed two new works: Mfoniso Udofia’s “creation stories and all the important importants,” directed by Tamilla Woodard, and Emma Watkins’s “Pretend It’s Pretend,” directed by Annie Tippe. The Tow will also host the return of “The Comedy Series” in spring 2027 and “The Reading Series,” with works selected by Jackie Sibblies Drury, Amy Herzog, Samuel D. Hunter, Martyna Majok and Dominique Morisseau.
The season’s special programming also points toward a more open, public-facing Lincoln Center Theater. “The Composer Series,” held at the Vivian Beaumont, will feature Sara Bareilles, Lin-Manuel Miranda, and Pasek & Paul in concerts that pair established musical theater writers with newer artists. Winter and spring galas are planned for December 7, 2026, and May 17, 2027.
Lincoln Center Theater is also expanding its education and community engagement programs, continuing school residencies, student matinees and free public programming intended to bring more New Yorkers into the building — not simply as ticket buyers, but as participants. The theater is also reopening and restructuring its membership program, offering new tiers for audiences with different levels of access and commitment.
For deBessonet, whose work has often leaned toward communal experience and large-scale feeling, the season reads like both a declaration and a test. There are canonical works here, yes, but also an effort to reframe the canon as something living, not preserved under glass. “A Few Good Men” asks what truth costs. “The Sound of Music” asks what courage looks like in a darkening world. “Seven Guitars” asks what art and ambition demand from African American life. The new plays ask what creation, grief, imagination, and belonging might mean now.
It is a season of revivals, premieres, concerts, readings, comedy, community gatherings, and stars with recognizable names. But beneath the busy architecture is a simpler proposition: theater, at its best, is still a place where people gather to measure the world together.
For updates on tickets and the 2026-2027 season, visit LCT.org.
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