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Premiere Stages presents "Mud Row"

originally published: 06/29/2022

(UNION, NJ) -- Premiere Stages at Kean University presents the New Jersey Premiere of Dominique Morisseau’s Mud Row July 14-31 in Kean University’s Bauer Boucher Theatre Center. Directed by Marshall Jones III,  Mud Row will feature actors Ashley Nicole Baptiste, Lekethia Dalcoe, Alinca Hamilton, Malik Reed, Stacey Sherrell, and Landon Woodson.

Two generations of sisters navigate class, race, love and family on “Mud Row,” an area in the East End of West Chester, Pennsylvania. Elsie hopes to move up in the world by marrying into “the talented tenth,” while her sister Frances joins the fight for Civil Rights. Decades later, estranged sisters Regine and Toshi are forced to reckon with their shared heritage and each other, when Regine inherits granny Elsie’s house.

The play was first produced by People’s Light (Abigail Adams, Executive Artistic Director; Zak Berkman, Producing Director) in Malvern, Pennsylvania on June 26, 2019. Mud Row is presented by arrangement with Concord Theatricals on behalf of Samuel French, Inc. 

Pictured: Lekethia Dalcoe and Ashley Nicole Baptiste. Photo by Ian Alfano.

A 2022 Tony Award  nominee, Dominique Morisseau is the author of The Detroit Project (A 3-Play Cycle): Skeleton Crew (Atlantic Theater Company), Paradise Blue (Signature Theatre), and Detroit ’67 (Public Theater, Classical Theatre of Harlem and NBT). Additional plays include: Confederates (Signature Theatre), Pipeline (Lincoln Center Theatre), Sunset Baby (LAByrinth Theatre), Blood at the Root (National Black Theatre), and Follow Me To Nellie’s (Premiere Stages). Her Broadway production of Skeleton Crew (Manhattan Theatre Club) was TONY nominated for best play and she is also the TONY nominated book writer on the Broadway musical Ain’t Too Proud – The Life and Times of the Temptations (Imperial Theatre). TV/Film projects: She has served as Co-Producer on the Showtime series Shameless. She’s currently developing projects with Netflix and HBO, and wrote the film adaptation of the documentary STEP for Fox Searchlight. Awards include: Spirit of Detroit Award, PoNY Fellowship, Sky-Cooper Prize, TEER Trailblazer Award, Steinberg Playwright Award, Audelco Awards, NBFT August Wilson Playwriting Award, Edward M. Kennedy Prize for Drama, OBIE Award (2), and the Ford Foundation Art of Change Fellowship, named one of Variety’s Women of Impact for 2017-18 and a recipient of the 2018 MacArthur Genius Grant.

“After producing the first Premiere of Dominique Morisseau's first play, Follow Me to Nellies in 2011 and the NJ Premiere of her play Skeleton Crew in 2016, we could not be more pleased to be launching our first full season in three years with such an important and powerful story,” stated John J. Wooten, Premiere Stages Producing Artistic Director.

 

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Director Marshall Jones last worked with Premiere Stages in October 2020 with a live, in-person critically acclaimed show about civil rights icon Fannie Lou Hamer starring veteran Broadway actress Rema Webb. For 13 years (2007-2019), he was the Producing Artistic Director for the Tony® Award-winning Crossroads Theatre Company where he directed several shows including the New Brunswick Performing Arts Center’s inaugural production – Paul Robeson. Selected other directing credits include the world premiere of Walter Mosley’s Lift, which later played Off Broadway; and Nikkole Salter’s Repairing a Nation, which was recorded for TV broadcast on WNET’s Theater Close-Up Series. 

The accomplished cast includes Ashley Nicole Baptiste, whose theatre credits include When Day Comes (Crossroads Theatre Company) and Seven Guitars (Artists Repertory Theater), Lekethia Dalcoe, whose acting credits include Autumn (Billie Holiday Theatre) and Zoohouse (National Black Theatre); Alinca Hamilton, whose theatre credits include Gong Lum’s Legacy (New Federal Theater) and Julius Cesar (Classic Stage Company); Malik Reed, whose television credits include Law & Order: Organized Crime (NBC) and season 2 of Random Acts of Flyness (HBO), Stacey Sherrell, whose television credits include Billions (Showtime) and The Equalizer (CBS), and Landon Woodson whose theatre credits include Black History Museum (HERE Arts Center) and Too Heavy for Your Pocket (George Street Playhouse).

Understudies for the production are Destiny Davis, Tisa Harriott and Nate Lyles. All three actors are graduates of Kean University’s Theatre Conservatory.

Mud Row runs July 14-July 31 in the Bauer Boucher Theatre Center on the Kean University main campus in Union, New Jersey. Performances take place Thursdays and Fridays at 8:00pm, Saturdays at 3:00pm and 8:00pm, and Sundays at 3:00pm.  

Tickets are $35 standard, $25 for senior citizens and Kean alumni and staff, $20 for patrons with disabilities and $15 for students. Significant discounts for groups of ten or more apply. Tickets are available for purchase online or by calling 908-737-7469. Assistive listening devices and sign-interpretation are available upon request; please call 908-737-4077 at least two weeks prior to your desired performance. 

Premiere Stages is made possible in part through funding from W. John Bauer and Nancy Boucher, The New Jersey State Council on the Arts, The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, Carole Shaffer-Koros and Robert Koros and ExxonMobil Foundation, The Dubose and Dorothy Heyward Foundation, The Northfield Bank Foundation, The Hyde and Watson Foundation, The Union Foundation, E.J. Grassmann Trust, The New Jersey Theatre Alliance, Investors Foundation, The Union County HEART Grant and through the generous support of individual patrons and local organizations. Discover Jersey Arts is our marketing partner. Visit JerseyArts.com for more information about other arts programming happening around the Garden State. 

Premiere Stages is committed to producing topical plays and interactive programs that reflect people of all ethnic and racial backgrounds, national origins, nationalities, ancestry, religious groups, gender expression or identities, sexual orientation, political beliefs, ages, abilities and disabilities. 

Created in 2004, Premiere Stages is the professional Equity theatre in residence at Kean University. Through its unique partnership with Kean, Premiere’s play development programs, educational initiatives, and professional development opportunities actively embrace the university's academic curriculum while expanding the scope, accessibility, and prestige of the professional programming on campus. 

ounded in 1855, Kean University is one of the largest metropolitan institutions of higher education in the region, with a richly diverse student, faculty and staff population. Kean continues to play a key role in the training of teachers and is a hub of educational, technological and cultural enrichment serving more than 16,000 students. The University’s six undergraduate colleges offer more than 50 undergraduate degrees over a full range of academic subjects. The Nathan Weiss Graduate College offers six doctoral degree programs and more than 80 options for graduate study leading to master’s degrees, professional diplomas or certifications. With campuses in Union, Toms River, Jefferson and Manahawkin, New Jersey, and Wenzhou, China, Kean University furthers its mission by providing an affordable and accessible world-class education.