Outside the St. James Theater on Sunday night, curious onlookers joined a throng of photographers as, amid a sea of flash bulbs, stars descended on a black carpet for the opening night of a buzzy new revival of the classic musical “Sunset Boulevard.”
“I’m thrilled to see this,” said Betty Buckley, 77, who played the role of the faded silent-film star Norma Desmond in the Andrew Lloyd Webber musical in London and on Broadway in the 1990s.
The show, which tells the story of Ms. Desmond’s descent into madness as she is forced to come to grips with an industry that discards its female stars at an ever-earlier age, stars the 46-year-old Nicole Scherzinger, a former Pussycat Doll, in the role.
The new production, helmed by the minimalist director Jamie Lloyd, who also directed a London run last year, is in many ways a daring update of the original musical, which opened in the West End in 1993.
ImageThe show’s director, Jamie Lloyd, with its choreographer, Fabian Aloise, at the after-party.ImageTom Francis, who plays the young screenwriter Joe Gillis, received a standing ovation for a sequence in which he sings the show’s title number as he is followed onto the street by a live feed.Credit...Rebecca Smeyne for The New York TimesImage
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