Christina DeCicco, Ted Keegan & More Set for Reading, Demo of New Musical AKHENATEN

The new musical "Akhenaten the Musical" will gather an all-star cast for a demo recording of 7 songs on Feb 15 followed by a 29-hour reading starting March 9.

The cast includes Christina DeCicco (Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, Evita) as Nefertiti, N'Kenge (Motown, Sondheim on Sondheim) as Queen Ti, Ted Keegan (The Phantom of the Opera, Sweeney Todd) as Maya the Great Priest of Amoun, Sean MacLaughlin (The Phantom of the Opera, Bombay Dreams) as Hur Moheb the Army General, Seph Stanek (Naked Boys Singing, I'm Harvey Milk) as the Scribe, Aaron LaVigne (Spider-Man: Turn Off The Dark) as Maho the Police General and DJ Bucciarelli (Grindr: The Opera) as Tut Ankh Amon. The actor for the title role of Akhenaten will be announced soon.

With a book by Hisham Abdel Khalek (Egypt, artistic director of Opera Aida under the Pyramids) and Mohamed Metwally (Egypt, writer of feminist novels), lyrics by Mohamed Metwally, and a music by Hesham Nazih (multi-awarded composer for cinema and TV in the Middle East), Akhenaten the Musical is directed by Hisham Abdel

Khalek and produced by H&O Production (Hisham Abdel Khalek, Egypt and Olivier Delesse, France).
Akhenaten the Musical tells the story of Pharaoh Amenhotep IV, who changed his name to Akhenaten, and his wife Nefertiti who supports him as he replaces the many Egyptian gods with one god, Aten. Surrounded by envious priests and Akhenaten's own jealous mother Queen Ti, Akhenaten idealizes a monotheistic Egypt and commissions the building of a new capital city to be erected in Aten's honor. But, when the priests conspire to return to power, Akhenaten's vision for Egypt is wiped out, along with his legacy as his son Tut Ankh Amon replaces him on the throne.

The creative team includes multi-award winning choreographer Chet Walker (Pippin), Drama Desk Award Winner projection designer Aaron Rhyne (A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder), makeup designer Joe Dulude II (On the Town, Wicked), hair and wig designer Charles Lapointe (A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, Newsies), Italian opera costume designer Giovanni Gobbi and Music Supervisor Charles Czarnecki (Jersey Boys).