(HOLMDEL, NJ) -- In the mid-1980s, aspiring playwright Alfred Uhry was seriously considering leaving the business after nearly two decades spent trying to find his voice and his subject. Instead, he sat down and wrote a play about his grandmother, not knowing that story would go on to win a Pulitzer Prize and four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, for the subsequent film adaptation. That masterpiece was Driving Miss Daisy. a modest, quietly told story about an old Southern woman and her driver. A brand-new professional production of Driving Miss Daisy will be presented August 7-23, 2026 at Bell Theater at Bell Works in Holmdel.
The play stars two-time Tony Award nominee Alison Fraser (original Broadway cast of The Secret Garden and Romance/Romance) as Daisy, Asbury Park's Bernard Dotson (original Broadway cast of Ragtime, Sweet Smell of Success and Paradise Square) as Hoke and Abe Goldfarb (Broadway's Beetlejuice the Musical) as Boolie. It is directed by Nate Patten (Broadway's Elf the Musical, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and Steel Magnolias at Bell Theater).
"When I was asked to direct a new production of this beautiful, Pulitzer Prize-winning gem of a play, I said yes as fast as humanly possible," said Patten. "I'm nearly giddy with excitement to collaborate with this remarkable cast of Broadway vets! Driving Miss Daisy has become an enduring classic, and I'm so honored to get to stage it for our enthusiastic audiences right here in New Jersey."
Uhry's grandmother, Lena Fox, was a Jewish widow living in Atlanta, Georgia. For years she was driven around the city by her Black chauffeur, Will Coleman. Uhry had watched their relationship closely, absorbing the rhythms of their conversations, the unspoken negotiations of their daily life together and the complicated tenderness that grew between two people separated by every social boundary the segregated South could erect.
In the play, Daisy Werthan, a sharp-tongued, fiercely independent 72-year-old Jewish widow living in Atlanta, has just driven her car through the back of her garage. Full of worry, her son Boolie hires a driver for her. Hoke Colburn is a dignified, patient and perceptive Black man who needs the work. But Daisy doesn't want a driver, she doesn't want help, and she certainly doesn't want Hoke. The play spans the relationship between them from 1948 to 1973, right through the Civil Rights movement, as two people from the American South who differ in race, class, religion and temperament develop a deep friendship and understanding.
From a car ride to the grocery store, a birthday cake shared in a church parking lot or a visit to a nursing home in the final years of their long lives, the play shows the way a genuine friendship can sneak up on you when you're not looking for it and couldn't possibly admit to it even if you were. What begins as a reluctant arrangement soon blossoms into a deep and enduring bond, proving that understanding and kindness can bridge even the widest divides. Poignant, funny, and profoundly moving, Driving Miss Daisy is a touching and timeless story of human connection.
Tickets are $69 and $79 for adults, $25 for students. Tickets are available for purchase online or by calling (732) 531-9106, ext. 14. Bell Theater is located inside the iconic Bell Works complex (101 Crawfords Corner Rd) in Holmdel, New Jersey with plenty of free parking.
Driving Miss Daisy opened in 1987 Off-Broadway at Playwrights Horizons starring Dana Ivey as Daisy and a little-known stage actor named Morgan Freeman as Hoke. It ran for three years and won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 1988, followed by the film starring Jessica Tandy, Morgan Freeman and Dan Aykroyd. Uhry won the Oscar for Best Adapted Screenplay. Tandy won Best Actress and the film took home the award for Best Picture.
Fraser, whose Broadway credits also include Gypsy, Tartuffe, Falsettos and The Mystery of Edwin Drood, is beyond excited to be playing the role of Miss Daisy at Bell Theater.
"I am honored to be making my Bell Theater debut as the quintessentially Southern, sharp-tongued, cantankerous, surprisingly irresistible dowager, Miss Daisy," she said. "Once our director Nate Patten told me I would have the privilege of inhabiting this iconic role, I immediately bought two copies of Alfred Uhry's Pulitzer Prize-winning script, one for me and one for various readers I could hopefully snag to be my Hoke and Boolie. I marveled at the economy of the structure - the clean, deep, fast-moving, fascinating narrative and the utterly human dialogue. Global, yet intimate; hilarious yet heartbreaking, this is a salute to meaningful aging, the responsibility of being informed and active about social injustice, the great bonds of family - both blood and chosen - the treasure that is memory, the hope that meaningful change can bring, and above all the pervasive love that is the essence of this play. Driving Miss Daisy is a quiet masterpiece and when called upon to serve it, one jumps at the opportunity. So, there I will be in August. Miss Daisy cordially invites y'all to join us at Bell Theater for what is sure to be a magical moment in time."
Driving Miss Daisy has scenic design by Cody Tellis Rutledge, costume design by Mariah Ansaldo Hale, lighting design by Paul Miller (Broadway's Legally Blonde, Amazing Grace), sound design by Gage Baker and wig design by Carissa Thorlakson. The production stage manager is Roe Manzo and the producer is Andrew DePrisco.
