Photo: Menelik Puryear
Slave Play, the ground-breaking play by Tony Award nominee Jeremy O. Harris under the direction of Tony Award nominee Robert O’Hara, announced complete casting for the production’s return Broadway engagement at the August Wilson Theatre. Joining the production are Devin Kawaoka as Dustin and Jonathan Chad Higginbotham as Phillip. They join returning original Broadway and NYTW cast members; Tony Award nominee Ato Blankson-Wood, Tony Award nominee Chalia La Tour, Irene Sofia Lucio, Tony Award nominee Annie McNamara, and Paul Alexander Nolan. Antoinette Crowe-Legacy will play Kaneisha, a role Harris wrote for the actress when he was a student at Yale School of Drama and which she originated in Slave Play’s first developmental production in 2017 as part of Yale’s Langston Hughes Festival. Slave Play features understudies Eboni Flowers, Blake Russell, Luigi Sottile, Elizabeth Stahlmann, and Galen J. Williams.
The strictly limited return engagement of Slave Play will begin performances Tuesday, November 23 ahead of an official opening night of Thursday, December 2 for a strictly limited eight-week engagement through Sunday, January 23, 2022. Tickets for the eight-week engagement are on sale now at www.seatgeek.com/slave-play-tickets or by visiting the August Wilson box office.
Additionally, the production announced that the first Black Out performance for the Broadway return will be Friday, December 3. This private, invitation-only performance will allow the Black-identifying audience to experience and discuss the play free from the white gaze. Harris birthed the idea of Black Out performances in the original Broadway run, in recognition of Broadway’s rich, diverse, and fraught history with Black work.
Tickets for the December 3 Black Out performance are priced at $100 or $45. For additional information and an invitation to this Black Out performance, please email rsvp@seaviewprods.com.
Slave Play has furthered its guiding principle of “radical accessibility” by doubling its ticketing initiative’s weekly commitment from the initial Broadway run. For the run at the August Wilson Theatre, 10,400 tickets have been made available for just $39.
Following the run at the August Wilson Theatre, the Broadway production, under the direction of O’Hara, will travel to Los Angeles as part of Center Theatre Group’s upcoming Mark Taper Forum season. Casting for the CTG run of Slave Play will be announced shortly.
The creative team for the production includes Tony Award winner Clint Ramos (scenic design), two-time Tony Award nominee Dede Ayite (costume design), Tony Award nominee Jiyoun Chang (lighting design), two-time Tony Award nominee Lindsay Jones (sound design and original music), Cookie Jordan (hair and wig design), Byron Easley (movement), Drama Desk Award winner Claire Warden and Teniece Divya Johnson (intimacy and fight directors), Amauta Marston-Firmino (dramaturg), Doug Nevin (production counsel), and Taylor Williams (casting director).