20-Year-Old Ice-Skating Assault Inspires New Musical Comedy

The apparently hilarious tale of one woman's violent obsession with making the 1994 US Winter Olympics team will get its most prestigious treatment yet, following the announcement that a successor to little-known 2007 production Tonya & Nancy: The Opera is bound for the Big Apple for the first time ever this year as part of next month's New York Musical Theatre Festival.

Described in promotional materials as "an Only-In-America tale of triumph, tragedy, scandal and skating", the New York premiere run of Tonya & Nancy: The Rock Opera has attracted high-calibre theatre talent to its ranks, with renowned Broadway performer Tracy McDowell (Motown, Rent) and former TV star Jenna Leigh Green (Sabrina, The Teenage Witch) filling the lead roles of Olympic figure-skating hopefuls — and bitter rivals — Tonya Harding and Nancy Kerrigan.

"I see it as a microcosm of American culture in many ways — the hyper-obsession with competition, the ethic of doing anything to win, and putting all this pressure on young people," show creator Elizabeth Searle explained to The Telegraph.

"I'm surprised things like this don't happen more often."

Also on board, according to the New York Daily News, are cast members Liz McCartney, Tony LePage, Andrew Aaron Berlin, Heidi Friese, Chase Kamata, Tatiana Lofton, Ryan MacConnell and Dwayne Washington. The libretto was written by Searle, with accompanying music by composer Michael Teoli. The creative team is decked out with Broadway vets too, including director David Alpert, musical director Henry Aronson and choreographer Marc Kimelman, among others. Though, to hear Searle tell it, it's unsurprising that so many mainstays have leaped at the chance to bring to life one of the late 20th century's most intense competitive feuds.

Well before their rivalry found renewed life on the stage, Harding and Kerrigan made headlines during the 1994 US Figure Skating Championships, when Kerrigan was forced to withdraw ahead of the competition after being injured in an assault, orchestrated by Harding's ex-husband and her bodyguard, in which she was struck just above the right knee with a police baton. Harding won the competition, but was stripped of her title when it emerged she had the opportunity — and failed — to prevent the attack. As a result, both women went on to be named for the US Winter Olympics team in Lillehammer, Norway, and karma offered a rare example of its existence with Kerrigan's consequent silver-medal performance, thoroughly outclassing Harding's eighth placing.

"It was one of the first crazy tabloid stories that took over 24/7 news coverage," Searle said of the production in a statement.

"One of my inspirations for pursuing it was that, at that time, the conservative commentator George Will made the comment, 'This is a ridiculous story that has nothing whatsoever to do with life in America today'. And I thought, ridiculous story, yes, of course. But it has everything to do with life in America."

Tonya & Nancy: The Rock Opera commences its maiden New York season on 9 July. See a clip from an earlier incarnation, starring Darcie Champagne as Harding and Kristen Lee Sergeant as Kerrigan, below.