An extended-in-the-works musical about Betty Boop, a curvy flapper first featured in animated movies of the Thirties, will open on Broadway subsequent spring following a run in Chicago final yr.

“BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical” has some thematic echoes of final yr’s “Barbie” film, though it was within the works earlier than that movie got here alongside. The stage manufacturing imagines that Boop leaves her early-Twentieth-century movie life to journey to present-day New York, the place musical comedy ensues. (Her first cease: Comedian-Con.)

The present was staged late final yr on the CIBC Theater in Chicago, the place The Chicago Tribune gave it an encouraging overview (“there’s a nice deal to love, and rather more work nonetheless to be achieved,” wrote the critic Chris Jones). The Broadway manufacturing is to open subsequent April at a theater operated by the Shubert Group, in accordance with an announcement from the manufacturing on Thursday; the manufacturing didn’t announce particular dates, theater or solid.

“BOOP!” options music by David Foster, a songwriter and music producer who has gained 16 Grammy Awards. The lyrics are by Susan Birkenhead (a Tony nominee for “Jelly’s Final Jam” and “Working”) and the e-book is by Bob Martin (a Tony winner for “The Drowsy Chaperone”). The present is being directed and choreographed by Jerry Mitchell, who gained Tony Awards for choreographing the 2004 revival of “La Cage aux Folles” and the 2013 manufacturing of “Kinky Boots.”

The musical’s lead producer is Ostar Productions, led by Invoice Haber, who was among the many founders of Artistic Artists Company and who has credit on greater than 50 Broadway reveals. “BOOP!” is being capitalized for as much as $26 million, in accordance with a submitting with the Securities and Change Fee.

Even for Broadway, the place musicals typically take years to develop, this one has had a remarkably lengthy journey: Haber has been engaged on a Betty Boop musical for greater than twenty years, altering inventive crew members and collaborators alongside the best way. In 2003, Selection reported {that a} Boop musical was deliberate for Broadway in 2005; in 2008, The New York Instances reported that Foster was hooked up and a Broadway bow was anticipated within the 2010-11 season. (Neither of these productions occurred.)

Betty Boop was created by Max Fleischer and was initially depicted, in a 1930 movie, as a poodle with some human traits; subsequently the character was totally human, though with inconceivable proportions. The character has been tailored in numerous varieties over time, together with for merchandise that has stored her picture within the public eye. She has been seen as a intercourse image of types, typically with quick attire, a squeaky voice and a signature expression, “Boop-Oop-a-Doop.”