{"id":95443,"date":"2026-09-07T01:44:35","date_gmt":"2026-09-07T08:44:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/?p=95443"},"modified":"2026-09-07T01:44:35","modified_gmt":"2026-09-07T08:44:35","slug":"london-theatre-shake-ups","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/blog\/2026\/09\/07\/london-theatre-shake-ups\/","title":{"rendered":"London Theatre Shake-Ups"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>What is no longer being planned for London is a reunion of <strong>Jonathan Bailey <\/strong>and <strong>Ariana Grande<\/strong>.&nbsp; The pair was scheduled to appear in <strong>Stephen Sondheim<\/strong>\u2019s <strong><em>Sunday in the Park with George<\/em><\/strong> in the <em>West End<\/em> next summer.&nbsp; As we previously reported, Ariana had already cancelled.&nbsp; And now, Bailey has also pulled out \u2013 but gently.&nbsp; No reason was given for his hasty exit other than saying that he made the decision \u201cafter much consideration\u201d.&nbsp; The producers are still going forward with plans, but I wouldn\u2019t be surprised if the entire venture is scuttled.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/colorbar1.gif\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-medium wp-image-568\" src=\"http:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/colorbar1.gif\" alt=\"colorbar1\" width=\"500\" height=\"1\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Jesse Tyler Ferguson <\/strong>is about to once again tread the boards as <em>bon vivant <\/em><strong>Truman Capote <\/strong>in the play <strong><em>Tru<\/em><\/strong>.&nbsp; Following his sold-out limited <em>off-Broadway <\/em>run earlier in the year, this engagement will take place at London\u2019s <em>Menier Chocolate Factory <\/em>from September 19<sup>th<\/sup> through November 14<sup>th<\/sup>.&nbsp; In preparation, Jesse caught up with <strong>Vanessa Williams<\/strong>, who is in the musical version of <strong><em>The Devil Wears Prada<\/em><\/strong> in London.&nbsp; The twosome chatted on Jesse\u2019s podcast, <strong><em>Dinner\u2019s On Me<\/em><\/strong>.&nbsp; Back in 2017, they appeared together in a <strong>Sondheim <\/strong>tribute concert at the <em>Hollywood Bowl<\/em>.&nbsp; They exchanged phone numbers and since then, he would occasionally send her photos of his kids or other updates, to which she never responded.&nbsp; When Williams was on <em>Broadway <\/em>doing the play <strong><em>POTUS<\/em><\/strong>, he sent her and several of the cast members a message on closing night.&nbsp; He got a text back from \u201cVanessa\u2019s\u201d number saying, \u201cThis is not Vanessa Williams!&nbsp; Please stop texting me.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Just as Jesse hits London, Vanessa Williams is leaving (Coincidence?&nbsp; Who can say?).&nbsp; Her final appearance as Miranda Priestly will be on September 19<sup>th<\/sup>.&nbsp; And yet the musical has extended its run through February 2027.&nbsp; So that begs the question \u2013 who will be slipping into her <em>Pradas<\/em>?&nbsp; While no official announcement has been made, people are whispering that <strong>Teri Hatcher <\/strong>is already in rehearsals!&nbsp; While this is shocking, it\u2019s not completely out of left field.&nbsp; Hatcher did appear in the national tour of <strong><em>Cabaret<\/em><\/strong> back in 1999.&nbsp; <em>Prada<\/em> needs a newsworthy name since it will celebrate its 800<sup>th<\/sup> show on September 23<sup>rd<\/sup>.&nbsp; Sounds like the perfect time to launch the next star.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What is no longer being planned for London is a reunion of Jonathan Bailey and Ariana Grande.&nbsp; The pair was scheduled to appear in Stephen Sondheim\u2019s Sunday in the Park with George in the West End next summer.&nbsp; As we previously reported, Ariana had already cancelled.&nbsp; And now, Bailey has also pulled out \u2013 but<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-95443","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-breaking"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95443","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=95443"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95443\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":95444,"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95443\/revisions\/95444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=95443"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=95443"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.billymasters.com\/custom\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=95443"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}