Video: First Look! Jerry Mitchell-Directed BOOP! THE MUSICAL Meets The Press!

First look! Broadway In Chicago's BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical met the press this week at Broadway In Chicago’s CIBC Theatre. Get your first look at the world premiere cast performing, "Where I Wanna Be" led by Jasmine Amy Rogers, in a production from Tony Award-winner Jerry Mitchell. 

Live on stage for the first time, the show will play a limited five-week engagement, November 19 - December 24.

Leading the cast are Jasmine Amy Rogers as Betty Boop (Mean Girls national tour), Tony Award-winner Faith Prince as Valentina (Guys and Dolls, “Monarch”), Ainsley Melham as Dwayne (Aladdin), Erich Bergen as Raymond (Jersey Boys, “Madam Secretary”), Stephen DeRosa as Grampy (“Boardwalk Empire”), Angelica Hale as Trisha (“America’s Got Talent” finalist), and Anastacia McCleskey as Carol (Caroline or Change).

The cast also includes Lawrence Alexander (Follies), Tristen Buettel (Bad Cinderella), Colin Bradbury (Funny Girl), Joshua Burrage (Cats), Gabi Campo (Some Like it Hot), Dan Castiglione (Yes Day), Rebecca Corrigan (In the Heights), Josh Drake (Aladdin), RJ Higton (“The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel”), Phillip Huber (Being John Malkovich), Nina Lafarga (In the Heights), Aubie Merrylees (To Kill A Mockingbird), Morgan McGhee (The Who’s Tommy at the Goodman), Ryah Nixon (Once Upon a One More Time), Christian Probst (Bad Cinderella), Ricky Schroeder (Kinky Boots), Gabriella Sorrentino (Hamilton), Brooke Taylor (recent graduate of University of Michigan), Courtney Arango (A Chorus Line), Ian Gallagher Fitzgerald (Kinky Boots), Sydney Jones (A Beautiful Noise), Derek Jordan Taylor (student at Boston Conservatory), Amy Van Norstrand (Holiday Inn).

Tony Award®-winning director/choreographer Jerry Mitchell (Kinky Boots, Pretty Woman: The Musical, Hairspray) brings the Queen of the Animated Screen to the theater in BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical, with celebrated multiple Grammy® Award-winning composer David Foster (“I Have Nothing,” “After The Love Is Gone,” “The Prayer”), Tony Award®-nominated lyricist Susan Birkenhead (Working, Jelly’s Last Jam), and Tony Award®-winning book writer Bob Martin (The Drowsy Chaperone, The Prom).   

Betty Boop, that sassy-sweet champion of empowerment, that spit-curled icon of joy, that songstress of strength, comes alive in BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical, the new Broadway-bound musical comedy extravaganza. 

For almost a century, Betty Boop, created by animation pioneer Max Fleischer, has won hearts and inspired fans around the world with her trademark looks, voice, and style. Now, in BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical, Betty's dream of an ordinary day off from the super-celebrity in her black-and-white world leads to an extraordinary adventure of color, music, and love in New York City — one that reminds her and the world, “You are capable of amazing things.” 

The design and creative team for BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical includes David Rockwell, set design (Broadway: A Beautiful Noise, Into the Woods [2002], She Loves Me [2016 Tony Award®]); Gregg Barnes, costumes (Tony Awards®: The Drowsy Chaperone, Follies [2011], Some Like It Hot); Philip S. Rosenberg, lighting (Broadway: Mrs. Doubtfire, Pretty Woman); Gareth Owen, sound (Tony Award®: MJ: The Musical); Finn Ross, projection design (Tony Award® The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time); Sabana Majeed, hair & wig design (Uncut); Michael Clifton, makeup design (New York, New York); Skyler Fox, illusions design (Volkov); The Huber Marionettes, marionette Design (Darling Grenadine Jeff Award nomination); and Daryl Waters, musical supervision and arrangements (Broadway: The Cher Show, Shuffle Along, After Midnight).

Boop-oop-a-doop! 

Individual tickets for BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical are now on-sale at www.BroadwayInChicago.com. Tickets for groups of 10 or more available by calling Broadway In Chicago Group Sales at (312) 977-1710 or emailing GroupSales@BroadwayInChicago.com.

BOOP! The Betty Boop Musical is based on the characters created by Max Fleischer. 

First introduced in 1930, Betty Boop was created by Max Fleischer for his “Talkartoons” series, the world’s first animated “talkies” which Max’s company, Fleischer Studios, produced for Paramount Studios. Betty initially appeared as a dog-like stage performer who sang and danced with another dog-like character named Bimbo, joyfully entertaining vast audiences of other Fleischer characters from the animal kingdom.  

Inspired by the collective energy, style, and sound of the many popular Jazz Age flappers and entertainers of the 1920s, Betty quickly evolved into a full-fledged human character, and by 1932 she had become the only female animated screen star in the world. Voiced by Mae Questel, Betty starred in more than 100 cartoons, 90 of which are included in the official Betty Boop series, which ended in 1939. Since then, Betty has appeared in dozens of hit movies, television specials, commercials, and was the first cartoon character to be profiled by A&E’s Biography series. 

Today, Fleischer Studios and their great team of creative professionals, have parlayed the iconic Betty Boop into a worldwide licensing phenomenon entertaining millions of fans and collectors alike. Please visit them online at www.fleischerstudios.com and www.bettyboop.com. 

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