The Heart

The Heart is a new musical built around one organ transplant. A young surfer dies without warning, and his heart goes to a woman who had stopped hoping for one. The action covers 24 hours and moves between the donor's family, the recipient and the hospital staff who connect them.

Roundabout Theatre Company produces it as a limited engagement at its Off-Broadway Laura Pels Theatre. It is the New York premiere of a show that had its world premiere at La Jolla Playhouse in California in 2025, and Christopher Ashley directs both productions. Roundabout presents it as its first new Off-Broadway musical in years. Kait Kerrigan wrote the book, and the married couple Anne and Ian Eisendrath wrote the music and lyrics.

The source is a 2014 French novel, Réparer les vivants by Maylis de Kerangal. Its US edition, translated by Sam Taylor, is titled The Heart; the UK edition is called Mend the Living and won the 2017 Wellcome Book Prize. The book also inspired a 2016 French film, Heal the Living.

The musical is set in San Diego and plays out mostly in hospital spaces. Simon Lamar, a young surfer, is hurt in a car crash after an early-morning session on the water. He is declared brain dead, although machines keep his heart beating. Simon never registered as an organ donor, so the decision falls to his parents, Marianne and Sean Lamar.

Thomas Driscoll, an on-call transplant coordinator, has to raise donation with the family, and he vows to stay with Simon until the surgery is finished. Nurse Cordelia Owl cares for Simon that day while also looking after her aging mother and a young son who is home sick. Juliette Brooks is Simon's girlfriend.

Once the family agrees, the story becomes a race against the clock. Marthe, an organ allocation specialist, has to match Simon's organs with recipients in time. His heart is matched with Claire, a woman with irreversible myocarditis; her surgeon is Dr. Breva. Other organs go to other waiting patients, among them a child in Los Angeles who needs a liver and a man in Newport Beach who needs lungs.

There is no single lead. Nine actors play more than 30 characters, and whoever is keeping the heart beating at a given moment becomes the protagonist. The themes are life and death, sorrow and hope.

Anne and Ian Eisendrath wrote the music and lyrics, with additional lyrics by Kerrigan. The score is electronic dance music blended with the sounds of a hospital: heart monitors, life-support machines, sirens and phones. The dance beat stands in for the beating heart.

There is no conventional orchestra. Music director Wendy Bobbitt Cavett performs the electronic score live at each performance. Juan Ariza and Elin Sandberg handled the orchestrations and music production, and Ian Eisendrath serves as music supervisor.

One number to look for is "Strike the Match," Marthe's song about the organ-matching process. La Jolla Playhouse also released studio music videos of "Keep Up" and "Dawn Patrol" during the 2025 run.

Movement and dance carry much of the storytelling. Video projections track the time limit on the heart and show hospital screens, and the video was checked with medical professionals for the La Jolla production. Lights pulse across the set walls and the stage floor.

The Laura Pels Theatre is Roundabout's Off-Broadway mainstage, inside the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre. The building sits below street level, and the auditorium is an intimate space in blue tones, with 336 seats in the orchestra and 74 in the mezzanine.

As of October 2026, the nine-person cast is Heidi Blickenstaff as Claire, Joaquina Kalukango as Marianne Lamar, Jason Tam as Sean Lamar, Nick T. Daly as Simon Lamar, Lincoln Clauss as Thomas Driscoll, Bre Jackson as Cordelia Owl, Max McKenna as Juliette Brooks, Drew Gehling as Dr. Breva and Wren Rivera as Marthe. Kalukango won the Tony and Drama Desk Awards for her leading performance in Paradise Square.

Kerrigan found de Kerangal's novel while researching transplantation, and she and the Eisendraths agreed to adapt it. Ashley joined the writers for a presentation at New York Stage and Film's summer season on August 2 and 3, 2024, in Poughkeepsie. A movement workshop with Moore followed before the La Jolla premiere.

The world premiere ran at La Jolla Playhouse's Sheila and Hughes Potiker Theatre from August 19 to October 5, 2025. It was first announced through September 21 and was extended more than once. The production also received an Edgerton Foundation New Play Award.

As of October 2026, Blickenstaff has been with the show since the start of its development. She played Claire in the 2024 workshop, at La Jolla in 2025 and in New York. Clauss, Jackson, McKenna, Rivera and Tam played the same roles at La Jolla. Kalukango, Gehling and Daly are new to their parts, taking over from Kenita Miller, Paul Alexander Nolan and Zachary Noah Piser.

The first preview was October 8, 2026, and opening night is scheduled for October 29, 2026. The Heart is the first Off-Broadway title of Roundabout's 2026–27 season.