Broadway in Fresno’s next season is announced. ‘Jersey Boys’ is coming back.
By Donald Munro
Jukebox musicals and film adaptations dominate the 2026-27 Broadway in Fresno season, which was announced Thursday, April 2.
Here’s the lineup:
Nov. 3-4: “Water for Elephants.”
Feb. 2-4: “Jersey Boys”
March 15-16: “The Bodyguard.”
June 8-9: “A Beautiful Noise: The Neil Diamond Musical.”
Pictured above: The cast of “Water for Elephants.” Photo: Matthew Murphy
Renewals for for subscription packages began Thursday, April 2 at 10 a.m. New season subscriptions will be available for purchase in June, with prices starting at $205. Subscriber prices vary depending on the
show time, day of the week and seating location.
My thoughts: Um, I’m just so-so with this season announcement. I’d been hoping for at least one blockbuster. (The last one we got was “SIX.” It’s been a while since we had a truly “big” run at the Saroyan Theatre, one that lasted one or even two weeks, like “Wicked.”) “Water for Elephants” and “A Beautiful Noise” are the newest titles, both of them with similar touring trajectories: “Elephants” (which opened and closed on Broadway in 2024), based on the novel by Sara Gruen, went out on the road as a non-Equity national tour. “A Beautiful Noise,” a jukebox musical, opened on Broadway in 2022 and ran through 2024. It sent out an Equity first national tour. The second national tour, non-Equity, will be the one visiting Fresno.
I also feel like we’ve fallen back a bit from this current season in terms of scheduling. For this season, we’ve had several weekend runs. For 26-27, we’re back to all mid-week runs.
That’s true even for “Jersey Boys,” which in 20-plus years has become a mainstay of professional and community theater around the world. It plays for three performances in Fresno. I would have expected it to have been scheduled for a week.
“The Bodyguard,” based on the Whitney Houston film, might just be the gem in this bunch. It opened in London in 2012 and never actually played on Broadway. (It had a U.S. tour in 2015.) The 2027 U.S. tour appears to be based on a revival that is currently touring through the U.K.
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