The Broadway premiere of Oscar winner Tarell Alvin McCraney’s play Choir Boy has found its complete cast.
Joining the previously announced Jeremy Pope, Tony winner Chuck Cooper, and Austin Pendleton will be Queen Sugar's Nicholas L. Ashe as Junior Blak, John Clay III (Encores! production of Grand Hotel) as Anthony Justin “AJ” James, Caleb Eberhardt (Is God Is) as David Heard, and J. Quinton Johnson, who recently concluded his run as Hercules Mulligan/James Madison in Hamilton on Broadway, as Bobby Marrow.
The ensemble will be made up of Daniel Bellomy (The Deuce), Jonathan Burke (Tuck Everlasting), Gerald Caesar (A Bronx Tale), and Marcus Gladney (Newsies.)
Choir Boy, directed by Trip Cullman, will begin performances December 11 at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre ahead of a January 10, 2019, opening night (previews were previously scheduled to begin December 27 ahead of a January 22 opening). Manhattan Theatre Club produces.
The music-filled play, which debuted to critical acclaim Off-Broadway in 2013, follows the hopes and dreams of the young singers at the Charles R. Drew Prep School for Boys, an institution dedicated to the education of strong, ethical black men.
Read: MOONLIGHT OSCAR WINNER TARELL ALVIN MCCRANEY TO MAKE BROADWAY DEBUT WITH CHOIR BOY
McCraney’s plays include Head of Passes (produced at the Public Theater Off-Broadway), Wig-Out (produced at the Vineyard Theatre), and In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue, which inspired the Academy Award-winning film Moonlight. The movie tells the story of a young man coming of age in Miami during the 1980s and won McCraney an Oscar for the screenplay. The playwright and screenwriter is a recipient of the MacArthur Fellowship Grant and is currently the chair of the playwriting department at the Yale School of Drama.
