More than 30 years after making her Broadway debut, she will temporarily step in for Tony Award winner Natalie Venetia Belcon to play an iconic Cuban singer.
¡Bienvenidos! TV and film star Gina Torres (Suits, Firefly, 911: Lone Star) will join the Buena Vista Social Club Broadway cast as Omara Portuondo from October 13 to November 29, while Tony Award winner Natalie Venetia Belcon takes a leave of absence to star in In the Heights.
Torres made her Broadway debut in 1993 in David Henry Hwang’s Face Value and starred in The Best Little Whorehouse Goes Public in 1994. More recently, she performed off Broadway in Pen Pals earlier this year.
“I am over the moon about joining the cast of Buena Vista Social Club and stepping into the shoes of the legendary Omara Portuondo,” said Torres in a statement. “I fell in love with the show and everyone in it when I first saw it. Being first generation Cuban/American, it resonated on so many levels. I grew up listening to these songs. They’re the heartbeat of everything that feels like home and connects me to my family and my culture. I trust that my parents, who have both passed, will have their hands on me, when I step onto that stage.”
The Buena Vista Social Club musical, inspired by the same-named band and its landmark Grammy-winning album, tells a fictionalized story of the artists who reunited in the ’90s to revive a bygone era of Cuban music, decades after the Cuban Revolution upended their careers and their culture.
Buena Vista Social Club won five Tony Awards in 2025, when it began its critically acclaimed run at the Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre. Learn more about the show.
Get Buena Vista Social Club tickets now.
Photo credit: Gina Torres. (Photo by Aaron Farrier)