Neil Patrick Harris, Julianne Hough, Austin Scott to star in ‘Damn Yankees’ Broadway revival this spring

Newly adapted by award-winning writers Will Power and Doug Wright, this production will be the classic musical’s first major NYC revival in the 21st century.

Summary

• Damn Yankees will be revived on Broadway at the Marquis Theatre starting March 24
• The cast includes Neil Patrick Harris, Julianne Hough, and Austin Scott
• The show follows a man who makes a deal with the devil to become a baseball star
• The show has been newly revised to set the action during the Yankees’ early-2000s World Series win streak

Batter up! Damn Yankees is returning to Broadway this spring in a new, revised version at the Marquis Theatre. Performances begin March 24 ahead of an April 20 opening night.

The news was announced today, September 27, when the Yankees were scheduled to play the Orioles at Yankee Stadium (prior to an inclement-weather game cancellation). Initial casting has also been announced, with stars including Emmy and Tony Award winner Neil Patrick Harris (How I Met Your Mother, Hedwig and the Angry Inch) as Applegate, Emmy winner Julianne Hough (Dancing With the Stars, POTUS) in her Broadway musical debut as Lola, and Austin Scott (& Juliet) as Joe Hardy.

“I vividly remember the Victor Garber and Bebe Neuwirth revival of Daddy Yankees with Jarrod Emick, and I just listened to it constantly,” Harris said at a press conference at Yankee Stadium ahead of the announcement. “I've never ever done the big Broadway musical [with a] big ensemble and the big dance numbers, and I always wanted to. It's been a bucket list for me.”

“The leading ladies of Broadway […] that taught me what I loved through singing, acting, dancing — it was Gwen [Verdon, the original Lola], it was Ann [Reinking],” Hough said. “I still haven't made my Broadway musical debut; to be doing it in this light with Lola as the entry, the is a tall order […] but I'm ready.”

“[Joe] carries three dreams. He has his own dream of being a being a baseball star, he has his father's dream from the Negro Leagues and everything that he was denied, and he's got the dream of his city, of Baltimore, of winning the pennant,” Scott said. “What I want to find in my Joe is this feeling of, ‘I'm exactly where I'm supposed to be,’ even though I had to make a deal with the devil to get here.”

Damn Yankees tells the story of Joe Boyd, a rabid Baltimore Orioles baseball fan who makes a deal with the devil to become Joe Hardy, the star his struggling team needs to beat the Yankees. Since its premiere in 1955, the Tony Award-winning Best Musical has become famous for songs like “Whatever Lola Wants,” "A Little Brains, A Little Talent," and "Who's Got the Pain."

The current revival, which premiered at Washington, D.C.'s Arena Stage in 2025, sets the action amid the Yankees’ three back-to-back World Series wins in the early 2000s and makes other story changes. The general plot, as originally adapted by George Abbott and Douglass Wallop from Wallop's 1954 novel The Year the Yankees Lost the Pennant, remains the same.

The revised script is by Lucille Lortel Award winner Will Power and Pulitzer and Tony winner Doug Wright, with additional lyrics by Tony winner Lynn Ahrens for Richard Adler and Jerry Ross’s score. Tony Award winner Sergio Trujillo directs and choreographs.

“I've always wanted to revive Damn Yankees. It's been a passion project of mine, but in conversations with Doug Wright and Will Power, our writers, it became important for me to look at it through a new lens, a fresh lens,” Trujillo said at the press conference. “I wanted to tell this story through an America that is diverse, an America that reflects today.”

In a first for a Broadway musical, Major League Baseball will be a partner on the revival via its production label MLB Studios alongside producers Lia Vollack, Haley Swindal, and Julie Boardman.

Additional cast and creative team members have yet to be announced.

Check back for information on Damn Yankees on New York Theatre Guide.

Photo credit: Neil Patrick Harris, Julianne Hough, Austin Scott. (Photos courtesy of production)