Yes, he will sell tickets, but MLK? Mr Jackson is 62; MLK died just short of 40. And they look nothing alike. And he's really not that good of an actor.
Just imagine what someone like Don Cheadle would do with the role.
"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe."
-John Guare, Landscape of the Body
I like him as an actor but i really don't think he is right for this. Cheadle is a good suggestion. I think they should find some new talent and cast a celebrity as the hotel maid. JMO
"Here's how producers describe the work: "Taking place on April 3, 1968, The Mountaintop is a gripping reimagining of events the night before the assassination of civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., as he retires to Room 306 in the now famous Lorraine Motel in Memphis, after delivering his legendary 'I've Been to the Mountaintop' speech to a massive church congregation. When room-service is delivered by a young woman, whose identity we puzzle over, King is forced to confront his past, as well as his legacy to his people."
Based on the description, I think it would matter.
I'm just really excited that Anika Noni Rose played the maid in the reading, I hope she does the full production.
"Some people can thrive and bloom living life in a living room, that's perfect for some people of one hundred and five. But I at least gotta try, when I think of all the sights that I gotta see, all the places I gotta play, all the things that I gotta be at"
Me too, uncageg, I never saw her live in it but her performance on the recording and the many clips I've seen of her in the OBC made me one of her biggest fans. Of course, once I saw her devastating and hauntingly beautiful performance as Maggie in CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF, I became an even bigger fan, she's simply one of the best stage actresses of her generation working today (she swept the floor with Terrence Howard).
"Some people can thrive and bloom living life in a living room, that's perfect for some people of one hundred and five. But I at least gotta try, when I think of all the sights that I gotta see, all the places I gotta play, all the things that I gotta be at"
It's a fictional plot about MLK meeting with an angel. Does it really matter if he looks like the role or is the right age?
In that case, let's get Bob Guillaime or Bill Cobbs for the role.
"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe."
-John Guare, Landscape of the Body
Too bad Roscoe Lee Browne passed away. He'd be spectacular.
"You travel alone because other people are only there to remind you how much that hook hurts that we all bit down on. Wait for that one day we can bite free and get back out there in space where we belong, sail back over water, over skies, into space, the hook finally out of our mouths and we wander back out there in space spawning to other planets never to return hurrah to earth and we'll look back and can't even see these lives here anymore. Only the taste of blood to remind us we ever existed. The earth is small. We're gone. We're dead. We're safe."
-John Guare, Landscape of the Body
Anika Noni Rose also starred in a recent reading of BY THE WAY, MEET VERA STARK, the new Lynn Nottage play getting produced at Second Stage next year.
Between that show and this potential project, here's hoping we see her return to theater at some point next season.
Tonya Pinkins: Then we had a "Lot's Wife" last June that was my personal favorite. I'm still trying to get them to let me sing it at some performance where we get to sing an excerpt that's gone.
Tony Kushner: You can sing it at my funeral.
Somethingwicked, that's great news, I love the idea of Anika Noni Rose in a Lynn Nottage play (RUINED was one of the most enthralling experiences I've had in the theater).
"Some people can thrive and bloom living life in a living room, that's perfect for some people of one hundred and five. But I at least gotta try, when I think of all the sights that I gotta see, all the places I gotta play, all the things that I gotta be at"