Jonathan Groff Eyes Broadway Return In Musical About ‘Mack The Knife’ Singer Bobby Darin

Tony-winner Jonathan Groff is set to star in a staged reading next month of a new musical about Bobby Darin, the 1950s-’60s-era singer who scored hits with “Mack the Knife,” “Dream Lover” and “Beyond The Sea,” Deadline has confirmed.

With an eye toward Broadway, Groff will perform the industry reading of Just In Time in New York next month. Alex Timbers (Moulin Rouge!, Beetlejuice) will direct the reading, as he did in 2018 when he teamed with Groff on an early concert version of the musical at the 92nd Street Y in Manhattan.

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The musical takes its name from the Jule Styne-Adolph Green-Betty Comden song “Just In Time,” which Darin, among many others, recorded.

Attached to produce for an eventual Broadway run are Tom Kirdahy and Robert Ahrens. The reading in New York will be staged under the auspices of the Arlington, Virginia, non-profit regional theater Signature Theatre.

A timeframe on a Broadway run has not been disclosed, nor has additional casting.

Singer-songwriter Darin had his big breakthrough in 1958 with the rock & roll novelty song “Splish Splash,” soon followed by “Dream Lover” and, with a slight pivot from teenybopper pop to Sinatra-style crooning, “Mack The Knife” and “Beyond The Sea.” (The latter song served as the title of a 2004 biopic starring Kevin Spacey). Darin next segued to a folksy phase, scoring a 1966 hit with the Tim Hardin-penned “If I Were A Carpenter.”

Darin’s personal life often made headlines: He dated singer Connie Francis, and the first of his two marriages was to the actress Sandra Dee.

In early 1973, Darin hosted the single-season NBC variety show The Bobby Darin Show. He died in December of that year at the age of 37 after a lifetime of ill health: a childhood bout with rheumatic fever left him with a weakened heart.

Just last month, Groff won a Tony Award for his lead performance, opposite Daniel Radcliffe and Lindsay Mendez, in the smash hit revival of Merrily We Roll Along.

News of the Bobby Darin project was first reported today by Philip Boroff’s Broadway Journal newsletter.

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