For most performers, participating in a Broadway show’s national tour launch is exciting enough in itself. For Westlake High School alumn Caroline Kane, it comes with the added surrealism of returning to the very stage that helped convince her she wanted to become a performer in the first place.
Kane will be part of the ensemble when Death Becomes Her launches its first national tour at Playhouse Square, running September 12 through October 3. Even more impressively, Kane also understudies both of the show’s female leads, Madeline Ashton and Helen Sharp.
It’s a fitting Cleveland homecoming for someone who grew up attending theater performances at Playhouse Square and watching national tours roll into town.
“I’ve performed on Broadway, but I’ve never performed in a national tour before,” Kane said. “I haven’t had loved ones that live in the Cleveland area be able to see me perform before. I remember going to Playhouse Square as a kid and seeing all the national tours come through. And I remember thinking, ‘Oh, this is what I want to do for a living.’”
Now, she’s the one stepping onto that stage.
“To come back to Cleveland and get to perform on the stage that I’ve seen so many amazing performers perform, it’s a dream come true,” she said. “It really is. It’s so special.”
And Kane won’t exactly be short on familiar faces in the audience. The Westlake High School Drama Club is expected to make an appearance, along with Kane’s former choir teacher, Mrs. Butler. Kane has also remained connected to the school’s theater program, even choreographing its musicals.
“I got to shout out to them because I choreographed their school musicals,” she said. “I think there’s a group of them coming in, which is really special. And my choir teacher, Mrs. Butler, she’s going to come in and see it, which is really, really special because I wouldn’t be performing today without all the people that helped raise me up in the performing and singing community.”
If there is any pressure that comes with performing in front of the people who watched her grow up, Kane isn’t letting it take over.
“The joy outweighs the fear or any nerves that want to take the wheel,” she said. “The joy outrides that for sure. It’s definitely like those dream moments that you dream about when you’re a kid and you’re living it in real life. And so it’s surreal.”
Of course, there are also some people from Kane’s past who might want to witness the homecoming.
Asked if there were any former foes who would have to buy a ticket if they wanted to see her back in Cleveland, Kane didn’t hesitate.
“Absolutely. Quite a few ex-boyfriends,” she said with a laugh. “It’s a good opportunity for any frenemies. They can step right up.”
That sort of playful attitude feels perfectly appropriate for Death Becomes Her, a musical that takes the outrageous premise of the 1992 cult comedy and turns it into a full-scale Broadway spectacle.
The original film, directed by Robert Zemeckis and starring Meryl Streep, Goldie Hawn, Bruce Willis and Isabella Rossellini, followed two women whose rivalry takes an increasingly supernatural turn after they discover a potion promising eternal youth. The film became known for its darkly comic tone and groundbreaking visual effects, winning the Academy Award for Best Visual Effects.
The stage adaptation keeps the essential ingredients while giving them the musical treatment. The book comes from Marco Pennette, with an original score by Julia Mattison and Noel Carey and direction and choreography by Tony Award winner Christopher Gattelli. The musical had its world premiere in Chicago in 2024 before moving to Broadway’s Lunt-Fontanne Theatre, where it opened November 21, 2024 and ran through June 28, 2026.
The idea had actually been brewing for years. A musical adaptation was first reported as being in development in 2017, and Mattison and Carey ultimately landed the project after pitching original material to Universal. Their collaboration produced a show that manages to retain the film’s campy, over-the-top spirit while expanding it with original songs, elaborate choreography, stunts, special effects and plenty of opportunities for performers to go gloriously big.
Broadway responded enthusiastically. Death Becomes Her earned 10 Tony Award nominations, including Best Musical, Best Actress nominations for Megan Hilty and Jennifer Simard, Best Original Score, Best Book, Best Direction and Best Choreography. It ultimately took home the Tony for Best Costume Design for Paul Tazewell.
For Kane, who was part of the Broadway cast of Water for Elephants and even had the opportunity to perform at the Tony Awards, stepping into Death Becomes Her represents another major milestone. But the national tour brings a different kind of thrill.
“It sort of feels like getting shot out of a cannon,” Kane said, describing the experience of performing for audiences that can include some of the industry’s biggest names. “To perform in front of people like Meryl Streep, it’s crazy to look out and see some of the most respected actors in the world watching you perform.”
In Death Becomes Her, Kane has the opportunity to show off virtually every part of her performing background.
As an ensemble member, she gets to move between multiple worlds within the story. The ensemble members become immortals who have lived for generations after taking Viola Van Horn’s mysterious potion. They also become part of Madeline Ashton’s glamorous Broadway world, serving as dancers and performers in her show.
“We get to occupy so many different worlds,” Kane explained. “We are immortals. We play Viola who sells the beauty potion. We are her minions. We are her posse, her group. And so we get to occupy these dark immortals that have been living forever that have taken this potion.”
Then comes the switch.
“We get to be Madeline Ashton’s background dancers and her Broadway show. We get to do so many different styles of dance and it’s like a light switch.”
For a dancer, that variety is particularly appealing. Kane gets to change styles, energy and character without ever leaving the production.
“And it’s really fun as a performer to get to occupy different kinds of styles of dance and different energies within one show, because sometimes that’s a rarity,” she said.
But her work doesn’t stop with the ensemble. Understudying both Madeline and Helen has given Kane an entirely different challenge.
“As an actor, to get to understudy both of these roles, it’s honestly the hardest job I’ve taken on in my career,” she said. “Between the two of them, they never leave the stage. It’s a lot of material, really challenging songs, and it’s just an honor to get to work with this incredible team and challenge myself in this way to understudy both parts.”
The story itself revolves around Madeline Ashton and Helen Sharp, longtime best friends turned bitter rivals—or, more accurately, frenemies with an exceptionally long memory. When mysterious beauty guru Viola Van Horn offers them a potion that promises eternal youth, beauty and vitality, their already complicated relationship gets considerably more complicated.
And, because this is Death Becomes Her, things get weird.
“It’s about jealousy, vanity, and a magic potion that promises to give you youth, beauty and vitality forever and what you would do if you were given the chance to drink that potion,” Kane said. “And obviously a bunch of hilarity ensues.”
Kane had already seen the Broadway production before joining the tour, so she knows firsthand what Cleveland audiences are in for.
“I laughed. I skipped my workout the next day because my abs were sore from laughing,” she said.
That’s probably all the warning anyone needs.
“It’s a comedy,” Kane continued. “You’re just going to have a great time. Come with your friends and it’s just a hilarious show. It’s dark and funny. So yeah, that’s what I would say. It’s magical, lots of really cool stunts on stage, some body horror, but it’s really fun.”
Years after sitting in the audience watching other performers live out their dreams, Kane gets to do the same thing from the other side of the curtain.
And perhaps that’s one of the most fitting things about Death Becomes Her launching its national tour in Cleveland. The musical is built around characters obsessed with staying young, beautiful and forever relevant, but Kane’s story offers something considerably more genuine: a performer returning to the place where her own dream began.
She’ll arrive in Cleveland with Broadway experience, a Tony Awards performance on her résumé, and a demanding pair of understudy tracks waiting in the wings. But she’ll also arrive as the Westlake kid who once sat in the audience at Playhouse Square thinking, That’s what I want to do.
Now she gets to prove it.
And if Clevelanders want Kane’s own recommendation for how to spend an evening with Death Becomes Her, she has a simple pitch.
“If you want to laugh ‘til your face hurts, come down to Playhouse Square where we’re going to have some beautiful dancers, actors and singers just for you and Death Becomes Her, based on the film with Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn,” she said. “Bring your girlfriends. It’s going to be a fabulous time.”
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