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鈥�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鈥檚 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.
The onstage jazz ensemble will feature Caylen Bryant on bass, Norman Edwards on drums, Victor Gould on piano, Langston Hughes on clarinet, sax, and flute, with trumpet player Alphonso Horne leading the band.
The Oscar Micheaux Project was recently named the inaugural winner of the Michael Friedman Award for New Composition, given in honor of the late composer-lyricist. The musical was initially commissioned by Prospect Musicals in 2021 with the support of a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts. It was featured in the 2023 National Alliance of Musical Theatre Festival of New Musicals, as well as the 2024 Village Theatre Festival of New Musicals, and was a finalist for the 2025 Richard Rodgers Award and the Eugene O鈥橬eill Theatre Center鈥檚 2025 Musical Theatre Conference.
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