LICENSE TO STRIP Heads Into Rehearsal

Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS has a released a first look inside rehearsals for Broadway Bares: License to Strip, this year’s spy-themed spectacular, ahead of its one-night-only return this Sunday, June 21, 2026, at New York City’s Hammerstein Ballroom. The newly released behind-the-scenes photos capture the more than 200 dancers as they prepare for an evening of secrets, seduction and high-stakes sexpionage, produced by and benefiting Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

The 9:30 pm performance is now sold out, with only a limited number of tickets remaining for the midnight show. Tickets are available now.

Among the special guests slated to slay are 2026 Tony Award winner Shoshana Bean (The Lost Boys), Taurean Everett (Death Becomes Her), Tony winner J. Harrison Ghee (Hadestown), Frankie Grande(Titaníque), Sydney James Harcourt (CATS: The Jellicle Ball) and 2026 Tony nominee Layton Williams(Titaníque).

The performers leading the choreographed production numbers are Erica Simone Barnett (A Sign of the Times), Keely Beirne (Moulin Rouge! The Musical), choreographer and dancer Khasan Brailsford, Milena J. Comeau (The Outsiders), DeMarius Copes (Some Like it Hot), Tony d’Alelio (Gypsy), Aydin Eyikan (MJ),Michael Graceffa (Death Becomes Her), dancer Chance Hoover, Cajai Kennedy (Wicked), Nika Lindsay(national tour of Frozen), dancer John Juan Mercado, Jimin Moon (Heated Rivalry: The Unauthorized Musical Parody), Alice Reis (City Center’s Machinal), MiMi Scardulla (Wicked), Emma Sofia (CATS: The Jellicle Ball), Joey Taranto (Kinky Boots), Preston Taylor (The Great Gatsby), Mitchell Tobin (Death Becomes Her), Jessica Mallare White (The Great Gatsby), Matt Wiercinski (The Great Gatsby) and Ricardo A. Zayas (Moulin Rouge! The Musical). Performers are subject to change.

Kellen Stancil, a Broadway Bares veteran and resident dance supervisor for the national tour of The Lion King, returns to direct. Joining Stancil as associate director is Paula DeLuise. Mitchell and Nick Kenkel, a longtime Broadway Bares director and performer, are executive producers. 

The choreographers fueling this pulse-pounding operation, alongside Stancil and DeLuise, are John Alix, Mike Baerga, Ilia Jessica Castro, Armando Farfan Jr., Elizabeth Fernandez, Alyssa Ann Meuser Gray, David Issac Gray, Billy Griffin, Miles Keeney, Nick Kenkel, Tanner Lane, Reed Luplau, Sarah Meahl, Jenny Oehlwein, Julius Anthony Rubio and Shani Talmor.

Last year’s standing-room-only edition took audiences on an over-the-rainbow romp down the yellow brick road. Broadway Bares: Come Out, Come Out raised a record $2.4 million, bringing Bares’ lifetime total to more than $31 million for Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS.

Broadway Bares receives generous support from presenting sponsor M∙A∙C Viva Glam and lead corporate sponsor ViiV Healthcare.

Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, the philanthropic heart of Broadway, is one of the nation’s leading industry-based, nonprofit AIDS fundraising and grant-making organizations. By drawing upon the talents, resources and generosity of the American theater community, since 1988 Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS has awarded more than $300 million for essential services for people with HIV/AIDS and other critical illnesses across the United States.

Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS is the major supporter of the social service programs at the Entertainment Community Fund (formerly The Actors Fund), including The Friedman Health Center for the Performing Arts, the HIV/AIDS Initiative and the Phyllis Newman Women’s Health Initiative. Broadway Cares provides annual grants to more than 450 AIDS and family service organizations in all 50 states, Puerto Rico and Washington, D.C., providing lifesaving medication, healthy meals, counseling and emergency assistance. At times of crisis, Broadway Cares also awards one-time humanitarian grants to provide emergency aid across the US and around the world.