Lincoln Center Theater (LCT) has revealed the complete cast for the production of McNeal, the new play by Pulitzer Prize winner Ayad Akhtar directed by Bartlett Sher. McNeal will begin previews on September 5 and open on September 30. The first Broadway production of LCT’s 40th Anniversary season, McNEAL will play a strictly limited engagement through Sunday, November 24 only at the Vivian Beaumont Theater.
The production will star Academy Award-winner Robert Downey Jr. as Jacob McNeal, in his Broadway debut joined by Brittany Bellizeare, Rafi Gavron, Melora Hardin, Andrea Martin, Ruthie Ann Miles, and Saisha Talwar.
Good writers borrow, great writers steal. Jacob McNeal (Robert Downey Jr.) is a great writer, one of our greatest, a perpetual candidate for the Nobel Prize in Literature. But McNeal also has an estranged son, a new novel, old axes to grind and an unhealthy fascination with Artificial Intelligence. Pulitzer Prize-winner Ayad Akhtar’s new play is a startling and wickedly smart examination of the inescapable humanity – and increasing inhumanity – of the stories we tell.
McNeal will have sets by Michael Yeargan & Jake Barton, costumes by Jennifer Moeller, lighting by Donald Holder, sound by Justin Ellington & Beth Lake, and projections by Jake Barton. Jennifer Rae Moore will be the stage manager. McNeal is produced by Lincoln Center Theater in association with Team Downey.