Rave reviews, decent ticket sales and some Tony Awards love aren’t enough to keep “Cats: The Jellicle Ball” from ending its Broadway run early.
The musical revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “Cats” will play its final show at the Broadhurst Theatre on Saturday evening, Aug. 8. It began preview performances roughly five months ago on March 18, 2026, and opened Tuesday, April 7.
Critics praised the radical move to transpose T.S. Eliot’s “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats” to the world of ballroom dance circa the 1980s, a time when drag culture was still underground and AIDS was a public health crisis. “Jellicle Ball” went on to receive nine Tony Award nominations and won three, including best direction of a musical for Zhailon Levington and Bill Rauch, as well as statues for Omari Wiles and Arturo Lyons’ choreography and Qween Jean’s costumes. Jean’s win marked the first time in history that an openly trans woman won Broadway’s highest honor.
“Jellicle Ball” put up respectable grosses. The show was earning between $900,000 to $1 million a week in the lead-up to the Tony Awards last June, though its sales fell after “Jellicle Ball” lost best revival of a musical to “Ragtime.” Musicals are costly to produce and “Jellicle Ball” has a large cast, which makes the economics particularly tricky.
“Three years ago, Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch began the remarkable process of reimagining ‘Cats’ for a new generation,” producers Michael Harrison and Mike Bosner said. “They assembled a visionary creative team that fused their passions for Ballroom and theater to create something thrillingly new.”
Later this month, the production will be filmed by the Theatre on Film and Tape Archive at The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts and added to its collection.
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