The Opening: The Second Most Famous Musical About Chess Opens Thursday

An Off-Broadway show called The Opening, billed as “The Second Most Famous Musical About Chess,” opens on January 8 and closes on February 8 at The Players Theatre in Manhattan. 

Since the most famous musical about chess, Broadway's Chess: The Musical, recently extended its run until May 3, 2026, players can catch both shows (and members can catch our review of Chess in this month's Chess Life - ed.). With unbeatable NYC winter offers, such as 2-for-1 Broadway theater tickets, winter is the best time to see these chess-themed musical theater shows.

Playbill

The day after attending Mindsets: The New York Chess in Education Conference, I saw Chess: The Musical on Broadway. I saved the show’s Playbill as a souvenir but I had not read through its 72 pages of content. When my son William looked through it a week later, he spotted, on page 67, a 1/10th page-sized ad for The Opening:

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Spotted in Playbill!

Because William saw that ad, we decided to travel from our home in Texas to NYC to see The Opening. Our decision indicates that its Kickstarter, which raised $31,561 to produce the show and put ads in every single Broadway Playbill for two months (December 2025 and January 2026), was likely a smart move.

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Graphic from Kickstarter

Smart Moves

Smart moves are nothing new for Brooke Di Spirito, the show’s co-creator. She has her own production company, The Sparrows, which will appear as the pit band for The Opening. She is a three-time recipient of the Huntington Arts Council Grant for her work with The Sparrows. As a ballet and swing dancer, Di Spirito frequently performs throughout the tri-state area and internationally, and she is a company member with Chevalier Ballet.

Northeastern Global News recently profiled her, since she is an alum of Northeastern University. After reading that article, William and I thought of some questions to ask her. Chess Life Online editor JJ Lang also contributed questions, which Di Spirito answered via email. This interview has been lightly edited for clarity.

AR: What’s been your involvement with chess throughout your life?

BDS: I fondly remember my grandpa Angelo Barbaruolo teaching me and my cousins to play chess when I was around five years old. He also woodworked into existence the chessboard we use in the show, which is a detail I am very proud of.

I recently found a picture of my grandma holding me at a chessboard when I was about one, so maybe it was even before then that I started getting interested! 

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Photo courtesy of Brooke Di Spirito

In any case, chess was a fun family activity for my cousins and I when we were young, even though we weren’t very good. I played throughout my life with friends and family but again was never very good, I just loved chess and thought it was awesome. My co-writer Mateo Chavez Lewis and I realized our shared love for chess and here we are!

AR: Has your relationship to chess changed since you began working on The Opening?

BDS: Since working on the show, it has been awesome to actually learn about chess from an academic perspective. Our main character, Newton, spends a lot of time studying openings, so I got to study openings to get in his head.

We also sing the actual chess moves in the show, and if I do say so myself they are very catchy! I ended up having some openings memorized just from that.

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Rehearsal photos courtesy of The Opening

We looked at historical and famous matches and pulled inspiration from there for all the chess game sequences. It will be so much fun to see how chess fans react!

AR: Why do you think the Magnus Carlsen/Hans Niemann scandal has captured imaginations?

BDS: The scandal captured imaginations because it was the perfect storm of the giant game of telephone that is the internet. It’s pretty crazy that what one person says as a joke can turn into a full blown scandal, and I think that was what was so fascinating to people — they didn’t know if it was a joke or not. If it was a joke, people thought it was hilarious, and if it was not, people thought it was crazy! Elon Musk weighing in of course only makes it even more insane.

AR: What did you learn about the chess world while creating this musical?

BDS: I learned so much about the chess world. One of the main things I learned about was how strong the internet chess community is — I had no idea it was so vast and diverse and enthusiastic! I knew GothamChess of course but it has been awesome to learn about so many other people who are making chess content and bringing chess to a really wide group of people. There has been this chess resurgence with the younger generations recently, I guess from The Queen’s Gambit, Covid, Chess.com, and chess influencers that I had no idea was such a widespread phenomenon.

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Promo photo courtesy of The Opening

The other things I learned I kind of mentioned above: First, actual chess, like, book openings and strategies and, second, grandmasters and famous moments from games. We have a sequence, for example, with a lot of old grandmasters visiting our main character Christmas Carol style. It was super fun to read about them and try to figure out how they might talk if they were in a musical comedy!

AR: Your cast posted a TikTok about “music from THE OPENINGwe can’t get out of our heads.” For us, it is “push your pawns up if you want, he will take them en passant.” What lyrics are you most proud of writing?

BDS: The “push your pawns up” lyric was a lot of fun, we tried to get an en passant joke in the show for about two years so we were glad one made it in. A lyric of mine that I really like is in a song called “El Trasero.” It’s a guy who is really good at chess and the ensemble is singing all of these silly things about him that get progressively more insane. Of these, my favs are the Halloween joke and the cat in cat and mouse, ha ha!

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But actually, a song that chess fans might find funnier is called “My Queen,” which is during a prom scene: think of a Frankie Valli type guy singing.

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If you're not looking at the lyrics, you might not get the “b4” and “d1” jokes just from hearing the show. But we are proud of them!

AR: There’s been some criticism of your show on Reddit. What’s your response to the haters?

BDS: In response to the haters, we want to make it super clear we are not in any way accusing Hans of anything! This is a show about a viral meme — not a show based on a true story or anything like that. Our characters are originals!

Also, the message of our show is more about friendship and the lengths a kid will go to for a dream, in the big picture. Again, not accusing anyone of anything! (But we did think the Reddit threads were really funny when people were saying such mean things about us without having any context!)

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AR: As mentioned in the Reddit thread, this theory has been the “butt” of other pop culture jokes. What's new about The Opening?

BDS: Our show features real chess. Chess games are being sung and played by the actors. That, and the emotional arcs related to the themes above, are where we are coming from — not sensationalizing a rumor that was proven false.

AR: What are your hopes and dreams for The Opening?

BDS: This is almost everyone on the team’s Off-Broadway debut, so our hopes and dreams are for a sold out run!

Even after winning a Players Theatre Self Producing Artist Residency, it was pretty daunting to try and imagine funding, organizing, and managing an entire Off-Broadway run. But, here we are, and I am so so grateful for the opportunity. So even if we don’t sell out or even get close, it will still be an amazing experience! To be making my Off-Broadway debut as not only a writer but as a producer, general manager, and choreographer at age 25 is something I never dreamed of!

AR: Why this scandal? Are there other chess scandals (e.g., Toiletgate) that you'd consider giving a musical treatment?

BDS: Hahaha! I think New York can handle two chess musicals...but I’m not sure about three!