“Now more than ever…” Who doesn’t roll their eyes seeing those much overused words, always trying to convince you that some book, movie, TV show, play, or musical is uniquely timely.

And then there’s Ragtime, the Lynn Ahrens-Stephen Flaherty-Terrence McNally musical version of E.L. Doctorow’s seminal novel that is back on Broadway in a revival at Lincoln Center Theater’s Vivian Beaumont. First premiering on the Main Stem in 1998, the musical tells an epic, sprawling story three groups of people whose lives and fortunes intertwine in New York City at the turn of the 20th century. There’s a rich, white family living in suburban New Rochelle; a Jewish immigrant who arrives on Ellis Island with his daughter in search of a better life than the one they left behind in Latvia; and a Black jazz musician, his love, and their child trying to make a peaceful life for themselves in Harlem. The sprawling story follows all three groups as they try to find their own version of the American Dream, an endeavor that constantly seems to pit them against each other—or at least feel as if they are pitted against each other.

To be more metaphorical, Ragtime is the story of America, the grand experimental Great American Melting Pot, that over a century later often feels just as wonderful, tumultuous, rewarding, scary, and difficult as it ever has. That Ragtime is timely, perhaps unsettlingly so, is not marketing spin. It’s just the truth. All you have to do to prove it is turn on the news and catch the latest soundbite.

That really crystallized with this revival’s first iteration, as a limited run last year at New York City Center directed by now-Lincoln Center Theater Artistic Director Lear deBessonet (who’s back to direct this time around, too). The 2024 Presidential Election—which brought the many issues covered in Ragtime back to the fore, perhaps none moreso than the rhetoric around immigration—fell halfway through the musical’s two-week run.

“During the City Center run, it was either: We’re going to celebrate how far we’ve come, how far we’ve moved from what this piece has to say and the themes of it, or we’re going to have to lean in and shine a really bright light on the issues that still plague America,” remembers Brandon Uranowitz, reprising his performance as Latvian immigrant Tateh from the earlier staging. “Once the election wasn’t what we were hoping it would be, it became this urgent call to action. And I’ve only felt that just kind of expanding since then, and the road ahead becoming more acute.”

That road ahead offered in Ragtime is what audiences should pay most attention to, according to the cast—which also includes Broadway favorites Joshua Henry as jazz pianist Coalhouse Walker, Jr.; Nichelle Lewis as his love, Sarah; and Caissie Levy as the patrician Mother, all also reprising their performances from the earlier run. And, they say, that’s also what keeps a show with some pretty heavy plot elements from feeling like a downer.

“Doing it at City Center last year was extremely healing,” says Lewis, a surprising response from the actor whose character endures some of the story’s bitterest tragedies. “Everything my character goes through can be daunting, but there’s a sense of hope, too. There is the ability for change. That’s something that I can hold on to, that things will be different one day, if we keep fighting for it. I’m really excited for audiences to see that, especially the younger generations.”

That we are still wrestling with much of what they’re wrestling with in Ragtime—with much of what our country has been wrestling with since its inception—could make one feel hopeless. Why can’t we seem to get it right? But according to the cast, that’s missing the point.

Ragtime, Henry says, is not about easy answers or tidy, feel-good endings. “[The writers] gave us such full characters who are not just heroes or just martyrs, who are not just villains,” he shares. That attention to complexity might just be one of the show’s greatest strengths, particularly in a political and social media landscape that seems increasingly obsessed with boiling everything down to right-and-wrong binaries. Throughout the musical, any character that makes personal progress does so by finding empathy for the people around them, even when it’s seemingly impossible to find. And for better or worse, we seem to be in perpetual need of reminders of the power of empathy, and the treachery of over-simplified binaries. 

“The show asks more questions than it answers,” Henry says. “It forces the audience to ask questions. There isn’t a nice, neat bow at the end. It can't be about endings, about perfection. We have to see the progress within every character. Even in the face of death, the joy and progress that comes. That's why it's worth telling over and over again. What do we have if we don't have hope?"

But this cast has to live in that difficult world eight times a week. How do they keep it from weighing down their offstage lives? “We lean on each other,” Henry says. “You gotta find the jokes backstage. You gotta kiki. We might be doing some heavy stuff onstage, and then we exit and lean into the joy. It’s still theatre—it’s still fun.”

“Which is what we’re all doing in life,” adds Levy, dropping maybe the biggest truth bomb of the year. The cast has to face the content of the show, just like audiences have to face the headlines and horrifying realities of the current world climate. “It’s what we’re all doing, always,” she says. “You put in, you get a lot out of it. And then you have to go about your life. You have to pay the bills and you have to deal with a sick child. It’s the gig, but it’s also the gig of being a human right now. Every single person is navigating that with their own personal responsibilities and their lives and their jobs, with just existing.”

Sorrow begets laughter, tears beget hope—the people called it Ragtime.

Click here for tickets.