Mark Jacoby, Robyn Hurder & Linda Powell Join Will Swenson Led A BEAUTIFUL NOISE: THE NEIL DIAMOND MUSICAL

Additional casting and the design team have been announced for A Beautiful Noise, The Neil Diamond Musical's world premiere, pre-Broadway engagement at Boston's Emerson Colonial Theatre (106 Boylston Street).

Tony Award® nominee Mark Jacoby, Tony Award nominee Robyn Hurder, and acclaimed actress Linda Powell will join previously the announced Tony Award nominee Will Swenson in the cast of A Beautiful Noise in Boston which will play a strictly limited six-week engagement starting Tuesday, June 21 and playing through Sunday, July 31. Tickets for the Boston run of A Beautiful Noise are now available at www.abeautifulnoisethemusical.com.

Jacoby created the role of Father in the beloved original production of Lynn Ahren's and Stephen Flaherty's Ragtime and received a Tony Award nomination in Harold Prince's revival of Show Boat. His other Broadway credits include John Doyle's Tony Award-winning revival of Sweeney Todd and the 1986 revival of Sweet Charity for which he received a Theatre World Award.

Hurder will be returning to Boston's Emerson Colonial Theatre where she appeared in the world premiere of Moulin Rouge! The Musical. For her show-stopping performance as Nini, she received a Tony Award nomination. She has also starred on Broadway in Nice Work If You Can Get It and the Kathleen Marshall-helmed revival of Grease. She memorably took on the role of Cassie in the 2008 Encores! revival of the landmark musical A Chorus Line.

Powell has appeared in the Tony nominated revivals of A Trip to Bountiful starring Cicely Tyson; On Golden Pond opposite James Earl Jones and Tyson; and Wilder, Wilder, Wilder. Off-Broadway she appeared in the New York premiere of Lucas Hnath's The Christians for which she received an AUDELCO Award nomination.

Swenson will be starring as Neil Diamond as a young man, fighting to get his music career off the ground. Jacoby will play Diamond now, at a crossroads that will have enormous consequences both professionally and personally. Powell plays the therapist who challenges Diamond to examine his past before it consumes him and Hurder will play Marcia, who meets Diamond early in his career and later marries him.

Director Michael Mayer said, "Neil Diamond has had a myriad of career highs which are a joy to celebrate, but sometimes as artists we look back and only see the mistakes, the roads not taken, the failures, and the aftermath success can leave behind. Anthony McCarten's book for A Beautiful Noise beautifully weaves these two perspectives together: the highs and the lows, looking forward and looking back, the artist as a young man full of drive and ambition and the mature artist looking back at an imperfect life."

Additional casting for A Beautiful Noise in Boston will be announced shortly.

The design team for A Beautiful Noise will feature Tony Award winner David Rockwell (scenic design), Tony Award nominee Emilio Sosa (costume design), four-time Tony Award winner Kevin Adams (lighting design), Tony Award winner Jessica Paz (sound design), and Luc Verschueren (hair and wig design). The production will have music supervision and arrangements by Sonny Paladino, incidental music and dance music arrangements by Brian Usifer, vocal design by AnnMarie Milazzo, and orchestrations by Bob Gaudio, Sonny Paladino, and Brian Usifer. The team also includes Bonnie Panson (production stage manager), Jamie Harrison (illusion consultant) Kathy Fabian (properties designer), Jim Carnahan, CSA (casting), and Ryan Conway of Architect Theatrical (general manager).

Including a score of Diamond's most beloved songs, A Beautiful Noise features a book by four-time Academy Award®-nominee Anthony McCarten (Bohemian Rhapsody, Darkest Hour, The Theory of Everything), direction by Tony Award® winner Michael Mayer (Funny Girl, Hedwig and the Angry Inch, Spring Awakening), and choreography by Olivier Award® winner and four-time Tony Award nominee Steven Hoggett (Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Once, Black Watch).

With his first break into songwriting in the 1960s and his meteoric rise in the 1970s, and plenty of crushing disappointments and heart-stopping triumphs along the way, Neil Diamond has maintained an almost unthinkable level of superstardom for five straight decades. How did a poor Jewish kid from Brooklyn become one of the most universally adored showmen of all time? There's only one way to tell it: a musical set to his era-defining smash hits that entranced the world.

Long loved by Boston, Diamond first played Revere, MA, in 1967 and he has subsequently played Boston and surrounding areas almost 40 times, visiting the city in each decade of his 50+ years of performing.

His iconic song "Sweet Caroline" has become an anthem to Red Sox fans where at every home game an eighth-inning singalong takes place at Fenway Park. The song's connection to Boston was seared into the hearts of millions when, in the immediate aftermath of the 2013 Marathon Bombing, teams around the Major Leagues played the song to show solidarity with the city. While at Fenway, Diamond himself took to the field to sing an emotional rendition of 1969 classic.

Throughout his phenomenal and wide-ranging career, Neil Diamond has performed at sold-out stadiums and arenas around the world, dominated the charts for more than five decades, sold over 130 million albums worldwide and achieved record sales.

A Grammy Award®-winning artist, Diamond is a member of the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame and the Songwriters Hall of Fame. He has been presented with the Johnny Mercer Award, the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, and the Sammy Cahn Lifetime Achievement Award, three of the highest honors bestowed on songwriters and artists. He has also been the recipient of the NARAS Music Cares Person of The Year Award and the prestigious Kennedy Center Award for his contributions to American culture.

But above it all, the rockstar is a doting grandfather, loving father, and adoring husband. His music has earned him a multi-generational fanbase and he is a believer of the healing power of music. Through his charitable foundation, he has supported many causes close to his heart.

In its storied history, the Emerson Colonial Theatre has debuted such seminal Broadway shows as Anything Goes, Porgy and Bess, Oklahoma!, Born Yesterday, Follies, A Little Night Music, Grand Hotel, and La Cage aux Folles, among others.

Reviving a great theatrical tradition, Ambassador Theatre Group's newly restored Emerson Colonial Theatre officially re-opened its doors in July 2018 and has hosted the pre-Broadway world premieres of Moulin Rouge! The Musical, David Byrne's American Utopia, and Plaza Suite starring Matthew Broderick and Sarah Jessica Parker.

Emerson Colonial Theatre, which opened in 1900 with a production of Ben-Hur, is the oldest continuously operated theater in Boston; as well as being amongst the most magnificent, having retained most of its original period details.

BIOGRAPHIES

Mark Jacoby (Neil Diamond - Now) originated the role of Father in Ragtime, earned Tony, Outer Critics, and Joseph Jefferson award nominations for his performance as Gaylord Ravenal in Showboat, directed by Harold Prince, and is a Theatre World Award recipient for his Broadway debut as Vittorio Vidal in Sweet Charity, directed by Bob Fosse. Also on Broadway, he created the role of Walter Hobbs in Elf, portrayed Judge Turpin in Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd, was the Padre in Man of La Mancha, appeared as Baron von Gaigern in Grand Hotel, and for three years held the title role in The Phantom of the Opera. Jacoby was seen as the Wizard in the First National Tour of Wicked, received a Drama Desk nomination for his Off-Broadway performance as the Playwright in Enter the Guardsman, and was Oscar Jaffee in the Goodspeed Opera production of On the Twentieth Century (Connecticut Drama Critics' Award). He played Guido Contini in the Chicago premiere of Nine (Joseph Jefferson Award), Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof for the Walnut Street Theatre (Barrymore Award), Mayor Dummermutt in The Visit for Signature Theatre (Helen Hayes nomination), and George in La Cage aux Folles (Carbonell nomination). Recent television guest-starring appearances include "Iron," "Dopesick," "The Blacklist," "The Good Fight," "The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel," "Elementary," and "Madam Secretary."

Robyn Hurder (Marcia) Broadway: Moulin Rouge! The Musical (Nini, Tony Award nomination), Nice Work If You Can Get It (Jeannie Muldoon), Grease (Marty), Chicago (Mona, Roxie understudy), The Wedding Singer (Holly understudy), Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (Violet). New York City Center's Encores!: A Chorus Line (Cassie), The New Yorkers (Lola McGee), Paint Your Wagon (Cherry Jourdell). National Tours: A Chorus Line (Cassie), Spamalot, Starlight Express (Pearl). Regional: 5th Avenue Theatre: Kiss Me, Kate (Lois Lane, Gregory Award nominee); Drury Lane: Crazy For You (Polly Baker); Shakespeare Theatre Company: Kiss Me, Kate (Lois Lane, Helen Hayes Award recipient and Emery Battis Award for Excellence in Acting recipient). Film and television: "Fosse/Verdon" (FX).

Linda Powell (Doctor) Broadway: On Golden Pond; Wilder, Wilder, Wilder; and The Trip to Bountiful (all Tony nominated Best Revivals). Off Broadway: Passage (Soho Rep), The Moors (Playwright's Realm), The Christians (Playwright's Horizons), The Overwhelming (Roundabout), Jar the Floor (Second Stage), Jitney, Angela's Mixtape: Pericles, Love's Labour's Lost, The Odyssey, Lucrece, A Midsummer Night's Dream, A Doll's House, The Courtroom, and 12 seasons producing and performing with the Willow Cabin Theater Company. Regional: Long Wharf Theater, Mark Taper Forum, Actors Theater of Louisville, Arena Stage, Cleveland Playhouse, ART, Williamstown Theater Festival, Pittsburgh Playhouse, Baltimore Center Stage and Portia in Compangnia de' Colombari's Merchant of Venice which has been performed in Venice, Montclair, New Haven, and Dartmouth. Television: "Dopesick," "Modern Love," "House of Cards" (recurring), "Madam Secretary" (recurring), "Chicago Fire" (recurring), "Law & Order: SVU" (recurring), "Bull," "Elementary," "Blue Bloods," "The Mysteries of Laura," "The Good Wife." Film: The Report, I Think I Love My Wife, The Best Man, Morning Glory, American Gangster, The Courtroom, and Draw Up and Stare. Powell is a graduate of the College of William and Mary, Circle in the Square Theater Training Program, and the school of Michael Howard. She is a proud member of Actors Equity, SAG-AFTRA and The Actor's Center.