General Hospital is staging a cross-promotional detour to Broadway this spring, bringing Aladdin star Michael James Scott to daytime television while two Port Charles residents make a side trip to New York. The multi-episode storyline will stretch from late April into early May, with key scenes airing April 24 and May 4, Entertainment Weekly reports.
On the April 23 episode, Gio (played by Giovanni Mazza) whisks his girlfriend Emma (Braedyn Bruner) off to New York for a romantic outing. The couple reunites with Gio’s old friend — Broadway’s Genie, Michael James Scott — on the April 24 instalment, with Scott appearing as himself. Scott, who has played the role of Genie in Disney’s Aladdin on Broadway since 2019, is scheduled to make a reciprocal visit to the fictional New York-adjacent town of Port Charles on the May 4 episode.
During his Port Charles appearance, Scott will take the stage at Curtis Ashford’s swanky Savoy club and deliver a jazzy rendition of “Friend Like Me,” the show-stopping number from Aladdin that Robin Williams famously voiced in the 1992 animated film. According to the storyline notes, Gio — a skilled violinist who once played in a Broadway orchestra pit — first met Scott during his time in the city’s theater scene, which provides the premise for the characters’ reunion at the New Amsterdam Theatre, where Aladdin has been playing.
The crossover dovetails with a number of scheduling milestones. Aladdin celebrated its 12th anniversary on Broadway on March 20; Scott is slated to give his final performance as Genie on May 3. General Hospital, meanwhile, marked its 63rd anniversary on April 1. The episodes featuring the crossover will therefore air at a moment of high visibility for both properties, highlighting the corporate connection: ABC, the long-time broadcaster of General Hospital, has been part of the Disney family since 1995.
Scott’s visit to General Hospital continues a recent pattern of stage and screen crossovers in entertainment promotion. He is no stranger to television, with past appearances on The Carrie Diaries and voice work on animated series such as Central Park and South Park, and he currently appears as Nurse Dubois on the revived 10th season of Scrubs. On stage, Aladdin’s current Broadway cast includes Rodney Ingram as the title character, Sonya Balsara as Jasmine and Dennis Stowe as Jafar.
The crossover is scripted into the soap’s daytime schedule: Gio and Emma depart for New York in the April 23 episode and meet Scott on April 24, while Scott’s Port Charles scenes are pinned to the May 4 broadcast. General Hospital airs weekdays on ABC and is available to stream on Hulu.