Article by Meg Masseron for Playbill.com 5/22/25
Complete casting has been announced for the Prospect Musicals production of The Oscar Micheaux Project, a new jazz musical that will play the Baruch Performing Arts Center next month. Following the life of the titular filmmaker, it will run June 13–21.
Exploring Micheaux’s career from silent pictures to the talkies as he battles the racism of Hollywood to bring Black stories to the silver screen, his legacy as America’s first major Black filmmaker comes to syncopated and soulful life in the new musical, which features music by Alphonso Horne, lyrics by Jesse L. Kearney Jr. and Peter Mills, a book by Kearney Jr. and Cara Reichel, and additional music by Mills.
Julius Thomas III (Hamilton) will star as Oscar Micheaux, alongside Ryan Jamaal Swain (Pose) as his brother Swan, Maya Sistruck as Evelyn Preer, and Nasia Thomas (The Last Five Years) as Alice B. Russel. They will be joined by Grammy nominee Saint Aubyn, Ladonna Burns, Marques Furr, Tymothee Harrell, Alysha Morgan, Anita Welch-Smith, and Curtis Wiley.
Kimille Howard is directing with choreography by Chloe Davis.
