The run closed March 20, 1954
- Opened
- March 29, 1951
- Closed
- March 20, 1954
- Performances
- 1,246
- Previews
- —
- Theatre
- St. James Theatre
Of the 705 productions we hold that opened in the 1950s and record a performance count, this is the 4th longest. That is a rank within what we hold, not within everything that was staged.
Other stagings of The King and I 5 more that season
| 1977 | Uris Theatre Revival · Yuriko | 695 perf. |
| 1985 | Broadway Theatre Revival · Mitch Leigh | 191 perf. |
| 1996 | Neil Simon Theatre Revival · Christopher Renshaw | 780 perf. |
| 2015 | Revival Revival · Bartlett Sher | 538 perf. |
| 2018 | London Palladium Transfer |
Who was in it118 named
Stephanie Augustine
Doria Avila
Jamie Bauer
Lee Becker
Mary Burr
Duane Camp
Raul Celada
Cristanta Cornejo
Rodolfo Cornejo
Robert Cortazal
Robin Craven
Beau Cunningham
Andrea del Rosario
Shellie Farrell
Charles Francis
Evelyn Giles
Tommy Gomez
Leonard Graves
Thomas Griffin
Geraldine Hamburg
Maribel Hammer
Marcia James
Margie James
John Juliano
Ruth Korda
Ina Kurland
Suzanne Lake
Norma Larkin
Miriam Lawrence
Baayork Lee
Barbara Luna
Nancy Lynch
Alfonso Maribo
James Maribo
Gloria Marlowe
Jack Matthew
Carolyn Maye
Len Mence
Helen Merritt
Helen Murielle
Ed Preston
Orlando Rodriguez
Corrine St Denis
Johnny Stewart
Nora Suarez
Prue Ward
Bunny Warner
Phyllis Wilcox
Dusty Worrall
Yuriko
Annamary Dickey
Patricia Morison
Patrick Adiarte
Purie Adiarte
Beverly Alleman
Michael Allen
Sara Aman
Otis Bigelow
Dennis Bonilla
Thomas Bonilla
Yvette Cardinoza
Jackie Collins
Jenny Collins
John Connoughton
Ronn Cummins
Barbara Davenport
Bettina Dearborn
Joan Fitzmaurice
Joan Garcia
Murray Gitlin
Jeanne Grant
Carmen Gutierrez
Ina Hahn
Jacqueline Hairston
Lorraine Havercroft
Julienne Hendricks
Rhoda Johannson
Dania Krupska
Lawrence Lee
Ronnie Lee
Geraldine Lorente
Carole Luna
Lucinda Macy
Richard Mercado
Sal Mineo
Anne Needham
Barbara Norman
Claire Pasch
Frances Russell
Meryl Sargent
Terry Saunders
Ruth Schoeni
Helena Schurgot
Jan Scott
Leon Shaw
Toby Stevens
Tao Strong
Beryl Towbin
Marie Traficante
Cordelia Ware
26 of these 118 names have a person record behind them and link to one. The other 92 are set from the identifier in the cast list, which is a slug of the name — so hyphens and full stops are lost and a few come out wrong. We hold nothing else about them. Nobody here is matched to a character: the cast list records who was in the company and not what they played.
Creative team
- Director
- John van Druten, John
- Choreographer
- Jerome Robbins
- Producer
- Lee Guber & Shelly Gross
A producer is one string on this record, however many people or companies it names. Directors and choreographers are held both as text and as identifiers; where an identifier exists the name links to a page.
Tony Awards 5 from 5 nominations
| Best Musical | Won |
Recordings 6 held for the work
None of these is attributed to this staging. They are filed against The King and I, and nothing in the record says which production any of them documents. Closing that join is the point of this catalogue and it is not closed yet.
Around this production
Gertrude Lawrence, who initiated the project, died during the run. Yul Brynner would go on to play the King over 4,600 times across multiple productions.
'The King and I' [1951], Williamson can make no tragedy of the story, because none has been set up but also because he isn’t putting much into it.
Speaker not recorded. More Opening Nights On Broadway Steven Suskin, p. 793Lines such as “At standing she could be sitting” and “Having happily had it with a spoon” reminded him of dialogue from The King and I at its “most Siamese.”
Speaker not recorded. The Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals Dan Dietz Hardcover 2014 Rowman Lit, p. 247- “Getting to Know You” was added during the tryout for Anna and the royal wives and children. As “Suddenly Lucky,” it had been intended for Cable to sing to Liat in South Pacific, but was dropped in favor of “Younger Than Springtime.” With a revised lyric, the song became one of the hit songs from The King and I. Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 140
- As of this writing, The King and I has been revived in New York eight times for a total of 3,052 performances. Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 141
- among the chorus singers was Marni Nixon, who became famous when her singing voice dubbed various actresses who appeared in film musicals (Deborah Kerr for The King and I ; Natalie Wood for West Side Story ; and Audrey Hepburn for My Fair Lady ). Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 368
- The revival of The King and I was the musical’s first since the original Broadway production had closed two years earlier. Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 533
- Like The King and I and Flower Drum Song, the musical seemed to shortchange its major character. Complete Book of 1950s Broadway Musicals the Dan Dietz, p. 842
Passages naming this production, found by keyword across 178 books. Where it turns up in the literature, not curated notes about it.
What this page does not know
- No photograph of this staging. 48 of 13,459 productions hold one.
- No character names. We can say who was in the company and not who they played.
- Which of the 6 recordings of The King and I document this run, if any.
- Reviews, box office, running order, understudies and designers: none of it is held for any production.