Jerry Frankel, Legendary Broadway Producer of ‘All the Way’ and ‘La Cage aux Folles,’ Dies at 88

Frankel produced over 50 Broadway shows and won nine Tony Awards

Jerry Frankel Broadway producer

Jerry Frankel, producer of over 50 Broadway productions and winner of nine Tony Awards for musicals, plays and revivals, died Saturday morning. He was 88.

The cause of death was not made public.

Along with his producing partner of nearly 20 years, Jeffrey Richards, Frankel was behind such Tony-winning hits as “All the Way” (2014), “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” (2012), “The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess” (2012), “La Cage aux Folles” (2010), “Hair” (2009), “August: Osage County” (2007), “Spring Awakening” (2006), “Glengarry Glen Ross” (2005) and “Death of a Salesman” (1999).

Some of his other Broadway producing credits include “Come From Away” (2017), “Fiddler on the Roof” (2015), “Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar & Grill” (2014) and “A Little Night Music” (2009).

Frankel’s talents expanded far past the Great White Way, having also produced commercials and two feature films, as well as manufacturing dresses and breeding thoroughbreds.

“To put it simply, Jerry was a class act and all of you who encountered him during his years in our business had to appreciate his forthrightness, great sense of humor, and passion for the theatre,” Richards said in a statement. “He will be greatly missed.”

Frankel is survived by his partner Mary Casey and his children: Elizabeth Bailenson, her husband Robert and their children Gabrielle and Lily; Jessica Genick, her husband Lee and their children Jacob and Chloe; his son Gordon and Gordon’s children Ruby and Zoey; and his brother, Ronald Frankel.

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