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Jennifer Lopez will star in NBC musical ‘Bye Bye Birdie Live’

pop star will play Rosie in new production

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(Screenshot via YouTube)

(Screenshot via YouTube)

Jennifer Lopez will be starring in NBC’s next holiday musical “Bye Bye Birdie Live,” Deadline reports.

Lopez will play Rosie, originally played on Broadway by Chita Rivera in 1960, and will be one of the musical’s executive producers. Tony-Award winner Harvey Fierstein is on board to write the script.

“Broadway musicals and films fueled my childhood and ‘Bye Bye Birdie’ was one of my favorites. I’m proud to be a part of the NBC family with Shades of Blue and I thought it would be a blast to take on one of their big live musicals,” Lopez said in a statement.

“Bye Bye Birdie” tells the story of music heartthrob Conrad Birdie who must give his one last kiss to a teenage girl living in Sweet Apple, Ohio before he is drafted into the army. The story was inspired by Elvis Pressley’s real life draft notice into the army in 1957.

The Broadway musical originally starred Dick Van Dyke as Albert Patterson alongside Rivera. It was adapted into a Golden Globe-nominated movie in 1963 with Janet Leigh as Rosie and Van Dyke reprising his role.

“Bye Bye Birdie Live” is scheduled to air in the 2017 holiday season.

 

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