George Clooney to make his Broadway debut in a play version of movie Good Night, and Good Luck

Clooney directed and starred in the original 2005 historical drama

George Clooney will make his Broadway acting debut in a stage adaptation of his critically acclaimed movie Good Night, and Good Luck, 20 years after its release.

Clooney originally starred as Fred Friedly, the longtime friend and news producer for legendary TV journalist Edward R Murrow (David Strathairn), in the 2005 historical drama.

In the forthcoming stage version, however – premiering in spring 2025 – the Hollywood star, 63, will instead take over the role of Murrow.

“I am honored, after all these years, to be coming back to the stage and especially, to Broadway, the art form and the venue that every actor aspires to,” Clooney said in a statement.

The play Good Night, and Good Luck will be directed by David Cromer and premiere on Broadway at a Shubert Theatre to be announced. It will be again co-written by Grant Heslov and Clooney, who landed writing Oscar nominations for the 90-minute black-and-white film.

It also earnt Clooney his first directing nod and was among the best picture contenders. The title comes from Murrow’s signoff on the TV series See It Now.

A key part of Clooney’s film portrayed Murrow’s struggle to maintain support from CBS executives for critical reporting on Republican Sen Joseph McCarthy, known for accusing government employees of disloyalty.

George Clooney (2023 Invision)

Patricia Clarkson, Robert Downey Jr, Jeff Daniels and Heslov also featured in the movie.

Murrow, who died, aged 57, in 1965 from lung cancer, is considered one of the architects of US broadcast news.

“Edward R Murrow operated from a kind of moral clarity that feels vanishingly rare in today’s media landscape. There was an immediacy in those early live television broadcasts that today can only be effectively captured on stage, in front of a live audience,” Cromer said in a statement.

The Clooneys are boosters of journalism. Clooney’s father, Nick Clooney, worked as a TV news anchor and host in a variety of cities including Cincinnati, Salt Lake City and Los Angeles. He also wrote a newspaper column in Cincinnati and taught journalism students at American University.

At the time the movie came out, Clooney said his family took pride in how journalists held the government accountable during the paranoia of the 1950s communist threat. Clooney said he wanted to make a movie to let people hear some “really well-written words about the fourth estate again”.

Additional reporting by Associated Press