Zach Braff to Make His Broadway Debut in ‘Bullets Over Broadway’

Todd Williamson/Invision, via Associated Press Zach Braff

The Emmy Award-nominated actor Zach Braff (“Scrubs”) will make his Broadway debut next year in “Bullets Over Broadway,” the musical adaptation of Woody Allen’s 1994 film, the show’s producers announced on Thursday. Mr. Braff will take on the role of a young playwright in 1920s New York who, in order to get his work produced, is forced to cast a mobster’s talentless girlfriend, to be played on Broadway by Hélene Yorke. (John Cusack and Jennifer Tilly played the roles on screen.) The show is to begin previews at the St. James Theater on March 11, 2014, with opening night set for April 10.

In addition to Mr. Braff, the production will feature Vincent Pastore, who played Sal (Big Pussy Bonpensiero in “The Sopranos,” in the role of a mob boss. Other actors in the 29-member ensemble will include Brooks Ashmanskas, Betsy Wolfe and Lenny Wolpe. Still to come are the casting of two roles: the stage diva Helen Sinclair, played on film by Dianne Wiest in an Oscar-winning performance, and the gangster Cheech, a role for which Chazz Palminteri received an Oscar nomination.

Earlier this year it was announced that the Tony Award-winning director and choreographer Susan Stroman will take over both duties for the show. Mr. Allen is adapting his original screenplay, written with Douglas McGrath, for Broadway.

Although onstage Mr. Braff is known for his work in plays (“Trust,” “Twelfth Night”), “Scrubs” often featured musical segments in which his character broke into song.