'Waitress' closes early on Broadway due to Covid-19

The musical was scheduled to play the Barrymore Theatre through January 9.

Waitress is closing up. The return Broadway engagement of the musical, which was scheduled to run at the Barrymore Theatre through January 9, will not play the final two weeks of performances.

The show had previously canceled performances from December 21-23 due to Covid-19 cases in the company. On December 23, a statement was posted to the officlal Waitress Twitter account saying in part, "With only two weeks of performances remaining and due to positive cases of COVID detected in the company and crew at the Barrymore Theatre, the decision has been made to curtail the engagement which was scheduled to run through January 9."

Waitress follows Jenna, a waitress and expert pie chef stuck with a loveless husband and an unwanted pregnancy. When she gets wind of a pie-making contest with a hefty cash prize, she hopes to bake her way to a better life for herself. The musical was directed by Diane Paulus, choreographed by Lorin Latarro, and featured a book by Jessie Nelson and music and lyrics by Sara Bareilles. When Waitress first ran on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre from 2016 to 2020, it became the first Broadway show to be led by an all-female creative team.

The current Broadway engagement of Waitress was one of the first musicals to open on Broadway after the shutdown, playing its first performance September 2 with Bareilles as Jenna. At the time of closing, Ciara Renée and Joshua Henry were starring as Jenna and Dr. Pomatter, respectively.

Waitress is the second Broadway show to shutter this week due to Covid-19 complications, following Jagged Little Pill, which announced its closure on Monday. Multiple other Broadway shows have announced temporary performance cancellations after positive Covid-19 cases were detected in their companies. Find out which Broadway shows have canceled performances.