About the Show: Waitress

With a score by Grammy winner Sara Bareilles and a book by Jessie Nelson, the musical is based on the 2007 film by Adrienne Shelly. It balances biting humor with deep emotional honesty, anchored by songs like “She Used to Be Mine,” a raw expression of regret, identity and hope.

Waitress made history in 2016 as the first Broadway musical with an all-female creative team. It was nominated for four Tony Awards, including Best Musical, and has since toured nationally and returned to Broadway in a special engagement.

Waitress centers on Jenna, a gifted pie baker stuck in a loveless marriage and a small-town routine that leaves little room to dream. She spends her days at Joe’s Pie Diner, where the scent of butter and sugar offers more comfort than her own home ever could. When she learns she’s pregnant, Jenna begins to imagine a different future — one with more flavor and less fear — and a baking contest in a nearby county might just be her chance to start over.

At the heart of the diner are her two coworkers and closest friends. Becky is quick-witted, warm and unfiltered, a woman who’s spent years caring for her husband Phil, whose declining health has reshaped their relationship, leaving her to carry the emotional and physical weight of a partner who no longer sees her. Beneath her bravado is a woman who’s fiercely loyal, deeply tired and aching to be seen as more than someone’s caretaker. Then there’s Dawn, the youngest waitress at the diner, who’s slowly learning how to let herself be loved. Quirky, anxious and endearing, she dips her toe into online dating and finds herself in a romance with a poetry-loving suitor who may or may not be what she imagined.

Updated Showtimes and Location

The Northeast Florida premiere of Waitress will now run for four performances at the Ritz Theatre:

• Friday, May 16 at 8:00 p.m.
• Saturday, May 17 at 2:00 p.m. and 8:00 p.m.
• Sunday, May 18 at 7:30 p.m.