From Center Field to Center Stage: Bernie Williams Is Playing Guitar on Broadway — But Only for Three More Weekends
Bernie Williams traded center field for center stage — and the clock is ticking on the Yankees legend’s Broadway run.
Williams, 58, is playing guitar nightly in the onstage band of the Tony-winning musical “Buena Vista Social Club” at Broadway’s Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre, in a limited six-week run that began Oct. 22 and ends Nov. 29, 2026.
The four-time World Series champion and five-time All-Star is no novelty act: Williams is a Latin Grammy-nominated jazz guitarist who earned a Bachelor of Music in Jazz Performance from the Manhattan School of Music in 2016 and headlined Carnegie Hall in 2025. Co-producer Lin-Manuel Miranda helped bring him into the company.
The show itself has a closing date now, too: on Friday, Nov. 6, producers announced “Buena Vista Social Club” will wrap its Broadway run Jan. 17, 2027. The musical opened March 19, 2025, earned 11 Tony nominations and won five, including a special honorary Tony for its band.
Williams isn’t the only ballplayer in the building. Former Mets infielder José “Candelita” Iglesias is narrating the show through Nov. 15, Gina Torres (“Suits,” “Firefly”) plays Omara through Nov. 29, and Xolo Maridueña (“Cobra Kai”) joins the cast Nov. 17 through Jan. 3.
For millennials who grew up watching Williams patrol center field in pinstripes, the sight of No. 51 — retired by the Yankees in 2015 — trading a glove for a guitar on a Broadway stage is one of the year’s most unexpected second acts. But with his run ending Nov. 29, there are only three weekends left to catch it.
Photo: Wikimedia Commons — Bernie Williams in 2011.