(MILLBURN, NJ) -- Paper Mill Playhouse presents After Midnight from January 31-February 25, 2024. Conceived by Jack Viertel (former Artistic Director of City Center Encores!), this Jazz Age rhythm and dance extravaganza is an electrifying musical revue that transports you to the Cotton Club of the Harlem Renaissance, an unparalleled time in New York City when jazz and swing were king. The production is co-directed by Dominique Kelley and Paper Mill Playhouse’s Associate Artistic Director Jen Bender and choreographed by Kelley.
After Midnight intertwines the poetry of Langston Hughes with songs from big-band legends Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Harold Arlen, Dorothy Fields, and more. The exhilarating score features such hits as “I Can’t Give You Anything but Love,” “Stormy Weather,” “On the Sunny Side of the Street,” and “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing).”
After Midnight will star Angela Birchett (PMP & Broadway: The Color Purple), Sasha Hutchings (Broadway: Hamilton, My Fair Lady), Joshua Lamar (Lyric Opera: West Side Story; HBO Max: “Legendary”), James T. Lane (Broadway: Chicago, The Scottsboro Boys), Stanley Martin (Broadway: Disney’s Aladdin; International Tour: West Side Story), Aramie Payton (Broadway: MJ: The Musical; National Tour: Dreamgirls), Destinee Rea (PMP: Disney’s Hercules; Broadway: Tina: The Tina Turner Musical), Awa Sal Secka (Signature Theatre: Ragtime, Gun & Powder), Liv Symone (Broadway: Disney’s Aladdin; Starz: “Power Book III: Raising Kanan”), Harris Matthew Turner (Broadway: MJ: The Musical, Disney’s Frozen), Jasmine Pearl Villaroel (Centre Theater: Tuck Everlasting; Fulton Theatre: Grease), and Anthony Wayne (Broadway: Tina: The Tina Turner Musical, Once on This Island).
The production features music direction by Sean Mayes (Broadway: MJ: The Musical, Hadestown), scenic and lighting design by Adam Honoré (Broadway: Purlie Victorious, Ain’t No Mo’), costume design by Azalea Fairley (Broadway: Hamilton, A Strange Loop), sound design by Sadah Espii Proctor (Broadway: Trouble in Mind; Off-Broadway: Daphne), and hair and wig design by Alfreda Howard (Netflix: “Mystery Science Theatre 3000;” Off-Broadway: Mrs. Murray’s Menagerie). Casting is by Tara Rubin Casting. RL Campbell is the Production Stage Manager.
Paper Mill Playhouse’s 2024 lineup also features Fiddler on the Roof (through January 7, 2024), Gun & Powder (April 4– May 5, 2024), and Beautiful: The Carole King Musical (June 5 – 30, 2024).
Paper Mill Playhouse offers its audiences the opportunity to enhance their theater experience with behind-the-scenes views of mainstage productions, including Q&As held live in the theater with cast members. Paper Mill Prologues and The Director’s Viewpoint will be available to everyone on-demand in the Paper Mill Playhouse mobile app.
Award-winning access programs and services are available at all Paper Mill Playhouse productions, including audio-described performances, American Sign Language interpreted and open-captioned performances, Braille and large-print programs, and assistive listening devices.
Paper Mill Playhouse offers three-show subscription packages, starting at just $111. Each subscription package includes a different level of special benefits. Accessibly priced youth subscriptions are available for children under 18 with the purchase of an adult subscription. Tickets and subscriptions may be purchased by calling 973-376-4343, online at www.PaperMill.org, or at the box office.
Programs, dates, and artists are subject to change.
Paper Mill Playhouse, recipient of the 2016 Regional Theatre Tony Award, is a nationally renowned not-for-profit theater under the direction of Mark S. Hoebee (Producing Artistic Director) and Michael Stotts (Executive Director). A beloved New Jersey arts institution since 1938, Paper Mill creates and produces groundbreaking new musicals and reimagined classics. Several productions have gone on to Broadway and launched national tours, including Disney’s Newsies, Les Misérables, Honeymoon in Vegas, A Bronx Tale, and Bandstand. The theater is also the home to an award-winning center for musical theater education and artist training, with outreach programs that impact thousands of students each year.
As one of the nation’s premier musical theaters, Paper Mill fosters a creative environment to advance the art form, educate students, develop future theater lovers, nurture inclusion, and provide access for all. They acknowledge that their theater stands on the traditional land of the Lenni-Lenape, and they honor the Indigenous people who inhabited it for thousands of years before European settlers arrived.
Paper Mill Playhouse programs are made possible, in part, by funds from the New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts. Paper Mill Playhouse is a member of the National Alliance for Musical Theatre, the Council of Stock Theatres, and the New Jersey Theatre Alliance.
