Directed by Leonard Foglia, the production will officially open Oct. 14. The limited run is scheduled through Jan. 10, 2016.
Tyson and Jones are sharing a Broadway stage for the first time since 1966, when they appeared in A Hand Is On The Gate at the Longacre Theatre. They also starred in the long-running Off-Broadway production of Jean Genet’s The Blacks.
Tyson will also be a 2015 Kennedy Center Honoree Dec. 6 in Washington, DC.
The production features set and costume design by Riccardo Hernandez, lighting design by Jules Fisher and Peggy Eisenhauer and sound design by David Van Tieghem.
"Weller Martin (James Earl Jones) and Fonsia Dorsey (Cicely Tyson) meet on the porch of their nursing home and strike up a friendship, with Weller teaching Fonsia how to play gin rummy," according to press notes. "As they play, they share stories about the lives they led in the outside world. But when Fonsia wins every hand, Weller becomes increasingly frustrated, until their gin games and conversations become a battleground, with each player exposing the other’s failures, disappointments and insecurities." Tyson is a Tony Award winner (The Trip to Bountiful), a three-time Emmy Award winner (“The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,” “The Oldest Living Confederate Widow Tells All”) and an Oscar nominee ("Sounder"). Jones is a two-time Tony Award winner (Fences, The Great White Hope), three-time Emmy Award winner (“Heat Wave,” “Gabriel’s Fire,” “Summer’s End”) and the recipient of a Grammy Award and an Honorary Oscar.
The Gin Game returns to the Golden Theatre where the original production opened in 1977, starring Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy. The play last appeared on Broadway in 1997, in a production starring Charles Durning and Julie Harris. The Gin Game has also been filmed twice for television; in 1981 with original stars Cronyn and Tandy, and in 2003 with Dick van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore.
The Broadway revival is produced by OSTAR Productions.
The Golden Theatre is located at 252 West 45th Street between Broadway and Eighth Avenue. Tickets are on sale via Telecharge at (212) 239-6200 or (800) 447-7400 or online at Telecharge.com.
