One Room, Jonathan Groff Brings The Amish Project to the Broadhurst

Jonathan Groff will return to Broadway in The Amish Project, a solo play by Jessica Dickey, with performances at the Broadhurst Theatre on West 44th Street beginning February 10, 2027.

Playbill reported the news on Friday, October 23. Sarna Lapine directs. The rest of the creative team will be announced later, and no opening night or closing date has been given.

A solo play is a show with one performer on stage. Here that performer is a Tony winner, and the subject is close to home. The play is about a one-room Amish schoolhouse in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and Groff grew up in Lancaster, minutes from where the shooting happened, according to Playbill.

What Is The Amish Project About?

The Amish Project is inspired by the 2006 shooting at a one-room Amish schoolhouse. Playbill describes a close-knit community reeling from shock and grief, and the extraordinary act of grace that followed.

The real event took place on October 2, 2006, at the West Nickel Mines School in Bart Township. A gunman shot ten girls between the ages of 6 and 13 before killing himself. Five of the girls died in 2006, and a sixth died of her injuries in 2024. Four survived.

What the world remembers next is the forgiveness. Amish neighbors comforted the gunman's widow and parents within hours. Some of them attended his funeral, and the community set up a fund for his family. The school was torn down ten days after the shooting, and a new one opened nearby the following April.

The play is a fictional account of that week. It is told in monologues from Amish and non-Amish people touched by the shooting. It is not a true-crime piece. The weight sits on the aftermath and on what a community chooses to do with its pain.

Why Does Groff Want to Do It?

He has said so plainly. In a statement quoted by Playbill, Groff called the shooting "an unimaginable tragedy" that happened 20 years ago this month, and said Lapine sent him the script last year. He said he was floored by the urgency and poetry of Dickey's writing and by its central idea.

Sometimes the most radical human act is forgiveness.

Groff was born in Lancaster in 1985. He broke out on Broadway in Spring Awakening in 2006, played King George III in Hamilton and won the 2024 Tony for Best Actor in a Musical for the revival of Merrily We Roll Along. Most recently he originated the role of Bobby Darin in Just in Time at Circle in the Square, the musical we followed in One More Week, Ariana Madix Extends Just in Time to November 28.

Where Did the Play Come From?

Dickey's play started small. Playbill says it debuted at the New York International Fringe Festival and was developed at the Cherry Lane Theatre. It premiered Off-Broadway at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater in 2009.

It has since become Dickey's most-produced play, with stagings in Minneapolis, Chicago and around the world, Playbill reports.

That makes the Broadhurst a long way from the Fringe. The Shubert Organization's house opened in 1917 and seats more than a thousand. It is also where Tom Hanks made his Broadway debut in Lucky Guy in 2013. He announced his own return this week, as we report in Next Fall at the Fair, Tom Hanks and Kelli O'Hara Head to Broadway.

When Do Tickets Go on Sale?

A fan presale opens November 9 at 10 a.m. Eastern. General sales open the next day, November 10, at 10 a.m., Playbill says.

The official site confirms that Broadway performances begin February 10, 2027. It offers a sign-up for first access to tickets. It does not list prices or a run length, and neither does Playbill.

What to Know Before You Go

The Broadhurst Theatre is at 235 West 44th Street. Performances begin February 10, 2027. Sign up on the official site for first access, plan for the November 9 presale, and set an alarm for 10 a.m. the day after.

The play is about grief, and it does not hurry. One room, one actor, and a full house about to sit with the silence.