Purlie Victorious

Past Show

September 7, 2023 - February 28, 2024

Purlie Victorious is set on the heels of Reconstruction in an era when Jim Crow laws are still in effect in the American South. Its focus is on the dynamic traveling charismatic preacher, Purlie Victorious Judson, who returns to his small Georgia town hoping to save Big Bethel, the community’s church, and emancipates the cotton pickers who work on oppressive Ol’ Cap’n Cotchipee’s plantation. With the assistance of Lutiebelle Gussie Mae Jenkins and the community, Purlie hopes to pry loose from Cotchipee an inheritance that he’d use to achieve his own goals.

Co-Producer

Music Box Theatre

Playwright

Ossie Davis

Director

Kenny Leon

Cast

Leslie Odom, Jr., Vanessa Bell Calloway, Billy Eugene Jones, Noah Pyzik, Noah Robbins, Jay O. Sanders, Heather Alicia Simms, Bill Timoney and Kara Young.

Designers

Derek Mclane (Scenic) ; Emilio Sosa (Costumes); Adam Honore (Lighting); Peter Fitzgerald (Sound)

“A bucketful of bristling laughs. Wild, outrageous fantasy. Unique in style, rollicking irony, and rich in its highly individual humor.”

NY Herald Tribune

"Leslie Odom, Jr. leads a note-perfect cast that is a joy to watch."

The Guardian

"Kara Young is a revelation. She's got heavyweight-class comedic chops."

New York Magazine

"Uproarious! The wave of shrieking laughs from the audience showcases just how riveting Ossie Davis' play still is today."

Variety

"An Uncompromising joyous affair, broad in comedy and spirit."

Time Out New York

Featured Artist

Ossie Davis

Playwright

Ossie Davis–actor, writer, producer, director, and activist (December 18, 1917 – February 4, 2005)–is known as one the most prolific and fearless artists in American culture born out of Cogdell, Georgia. He has created profound and lasting work that has touched us all. Some of his credits span a career more than half a century old. Most notably, he has written and directed films (1970’s Cotton Comes to Harl), plays (including 1961’s controversial exploration of segregation, Purlie Victorious, and the book for its musical adaptation, Purlie!), and television films (For Us the Living: The Story of Medgar Evers).

Married to the equally prolific Ruby Dee, with courage and tenacity they have opened many doors previously shut to African American artists and planted the seed for the flowering of America’s multicultural humanity.

“When Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee were honored by the Screen Actors’ Guild with its highest honor, the Life achievement Award, SAG president William Daniels said: “For more than half a century, they have enriched and transformed American life as brilliant actors, writers, directors, producers, and passionate advocates for social justice, human dignity, and creative excellence.”

Kenny Leon

Director

Kenny Leon is a Tony Award-winning director who also has been honored with The Actors Fund Medal of Honor, an Obie Award, an NAACP Image Award, and the George Abbott Lifetime Achievement for American Theatre. Mr. Leon is the 2024 recipient of The Jason Robards Award for Excellence in Theatre. He was most recently represented on Broadway with the hit revival of Ossie Davis’ Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch starring Leslie Odom, Jr. Mr. Leon recently directed critically acclaimed productions of Ohio State Murders by Adrienne Kennedy and Suzan-Lori Parks’ Topdog/Underdog on Broadway. He will helm the revival of Samm-Art Williams’ Home opening in June 2024 at the Todd Haines Theatre. Broadway: Purlie Victorious: A Non-Confederate Romp Through the Cotton Patch; Topdog/Underdog; Ohio State Murders; A Soldier’s Play; American Son; Children of a Lesser God; Holler If Ya Hear Me; A Raisin in the Sun; The Mountaintop; Stick Fly; August Wilson’s Fences, Gem of the Ocean and Radio Golf. Off-Broadway: The Underlying Chris, Everybody’s Ruby, Emergence-See! (The Public); Smart People (Second Stage). Television: Robin Roberts Presents: Mahalia; Colin in Black & White; 4400; Amend: The Fight for America; American Son (adapted for Netflix); Hairspray Live!; The Wiz Live!; Steel Magnolias; Dynasty; In My Dreams. Author: Take You Wherever You Go. Artistic Director Emeritus, Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre Company. Senior Resident Director: Roundabout Theatre Company.