The biggest name in new plays this season will be in the program, not on the stage.

It’s John Grisham, whose legal thrillers and other works have sold a whopping 275 million copies worldwide. And now one of those thrillers — 1989’s “A Time To Kill,” the basis for the hit film starring Matthew McConaughey and Samuel L. Jackson — is coming to Broadway. It starts previews Sept. 28 at the John Golden Theatre.

But Grisham didn’t adapt it for the stage — Rupert Holmes did. No stranger to thrillers, Holmes won two Tonys for “The Mystery of Edwin Drood,” adapted from Charles Dickens’ unfinished work.

“It’s a lot more daunting when the author has gone to the trouble of completing his novel,” Holmes jokes. “Mr. Grisham had sole approval of everything I wrote. And believe me, when you’ve adapted Dickens and other writers who are not present, you’re very aware of the fact that the originator is going to be viewing your work.”

Set in the Deep South, the courtroom drama pits an idealistic young lawyer (Sebastian Arcelus) against the establishment when he defends a black man (John Douglas Thompson) who avenged the rape and beating of his 10-year-old daughter.

“I had license, with Mr. Grisham’s approval, to innovate a few turns and twists,” Holmes says. “There are new factors, scenes, confrontations . . . there’s nothing even guaranteeing that the outcome will be identical.”

The production, an earlier version of which played Washington’s Arena Stage two years ago, has a 13-member cast that includes former Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson in his Broadway debut as Judge Noose.

“He’s not just playing Judge Noose, he knew the Judge Nooses of that time,” Holmes says. “We had a table read, and we were all afraid that he was going to gavel us at any point.”

Here are other major new plays to watch for, on Broadway and off.

“The Snow Geese”: “Weeds” star Mary-Louise Parker, who recently said she’s ready to retire, plays a mother whose oldest son faces deployment overseas in WWI (Oct. 1, Samuel Friedman Theatre).

“The Commons of Pensacola”: Blythe Danner and Sarah Jessica Parker star as a mother and daughter coping with the aftermath of a Bernie Madoff-like scam in Amanda Peet’s play (Oct. 22, New York City Center–Stage I).

“Grasses of a Thousand Colors”: Another provocative new play by actor/playwright Wallace Shawn, this one about a doctor who believes the answer to world hunger lies in making animals eat their own kind (Oct. 7, Public Theater).

“Domesticated”: Jeff Goldblum and Laurie Metcalf play a couple whose marriage is threatened by scandal in this new drama by “Clybourne Park” playwright Bruce Norris (Oct. 10, Mitzi E. Newhouse).

“The Old Friends”: Betty Buckley, Lois Smith and Hallie Foote team up for the late Horton Foote’s drama about tensions roiling a Texas family (now playing at Pershing Square Signature Center, where it opens Sept. 12).

“The Jacksonian”: Ed Harris, Amy Madigan, Bill Pullman and Glenne Headly headline this new black comedy set in a seedy hotel in 1964 Mississippi by “Crimes of the Heart” playwright Beth Henley (Oct. 25, Acorn Theatre).