Oscar, Grammy, and Emmy Winner Common to Make Broadway Debut in Between Riverside and Crazy | Playbill

Broadway News Oscar, Grammy, and Emmy Winner Common to Make Broadway Debut in Between Riverside and Crazy

Austin Pendleton directs Stephen Adly Guirgis' Pulitzer Prize-winning play for Second Stage.

Common Brian Bowen Smith

Oscar, Emmy, and Grammy winner Common will make his Broadway debut this fall in the Broadway bow of Stephen Adly Guirgis’ Pulitzer Prize-winning Between Riverside and Crazy at Second Stage's Hayes Theater.

Directed by Austin Pendleton, previews will begin November 30 prior to an official opening December 19.

As previously reported, most of the original Off-Broadway cast will reprise their roles on Broadway, including Tony nominee Stephen McKinley Henderson (Fences, A Raisin in the Sun), Victor Almanzar (Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven), Elizabeth Canavan (Pipeline, Last Days of Judas Iscariot), Rosal Colón (A Free Man of Color, The Motherf***er with the Hat), Liza Colón-Zayas (The Bear, Water By the Spoonful), and Michael Rispoli (The Offer, The Deuce). Almanzar, Canavan, Colón-Zayas, and Rispoli will also be making their Broadway debuts.

Common will play the role of Junior, the part originally played by Ron Cephas-Jones.

A comedic look at life in rent-controlled New York City, Guirgis' play follows recently widowed ex-cop Walter "Pops" Washington and his recently paroled son Junior as they try to hold onto their rent-stabilized apartment.

Artist, actor, author, and activist Common most recently appeared opposite Keke Palmer in the film Alice, which premiered at the 2022 Sundance Film Festival. Other screen credits include Never Have I EverAva, The Informer, The Kitchen The Hate You Give, Smallfoot, All About Nina, Hunter Killer, Suicide Squad, John Wick: Chapter 2, and A Happening of Monumental Proportions, and he also serves as an executive producer of Showtime's The Chi and the Netflix drama Burning Sands. Common starred in the Oscar-nominated film Selma, and, with John Legend, co-wrote “Glory,” for which he won the 2015 Academy Award and 2016 Grammy Award for Best Original Song in a Motion Picture. He won his Primetime Emmy in 2016 for Outstanding Original Music and Lyrics for 13th. The rap artist's many albums include A Beautiful Revolution Parts 1 and 2, Let Love, and Black America Again. Common is also deeply engaged in social justice and advocacy work around mass incarceration, mental health, and voting. In 2018 he launched the nonprofit Imagine Justice. Through his Common Ground Foundation, he is dedicated to empowering high school students from underserved communities to become future leaders.

READ: After Years Supporting Stars Like Denzel Washington and Daniel Day-Lewis, Stephen McKinley Henderson Goes Crazy Off-Broadway

Pendleton, who also directed the cast Off-Broadway, returns with his original creative team: scenic designer Walt Spangler, costume designer Alexis Forte, lighting designer Keith Parham, and sound designer Ryan Rumery, who also provides original music. Casting is by The Telsey Office.

Between Riverside and Crazy made its Off-Broadway debut in 2014 at Atlantic Theater, where it had a sold-out run. Second Stage revived the show with the same cast and creative team at its Tony Kiser Theater Off-Broadway in February 2015.

Visit 2ST.com.

 
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