Cast Announced for Virtual Performances of BOX & COX

PrideArts Artistic Director Donterrio Johnson today announced casting for the second entry in the company's four - show virtual fall season called REIGNITE! Johnson will direct the hilarious comedy BOX AND COX by John Maddison Morton, a loosely staged production to be recorded live in the Pride Arts Center's Buena Theatre. The recorded performance will be presented online two nights only - on Thursdays, October 22 and 29, at 7:00 pm each night.

The cast of three will include Shalita Cake, known as "the happiest drag queen in Chicago," as Mrs. Bouncer, the landlady who rents a room to two men, with neither of them knowing the existence of their "roommate." Cake has been seen performing all over town, but mainly at Jackhammer on Monday nights in Chicago's Best Worst drag show. John Marshall Jr. a Jeff award nominee for PrideArts' YANK! A WWII LOVE STORY. will play John Box. Marshall is a veteran of productions with Porchlight Music Theatre, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Marriott Theatre, Paramount Theatre, Drury Lane Theatre, and Theatre at the Centre. The role of James Cox will be taken by Eustace J. Williams, who made his Chicago debut in Porchlight Music Theatre's critically acclaimed production of Duke Ellington'S SOPHISTICATED LADIES.

Before BOX & COX, the REIGNITE series will begin on September 30 with CLOSET PLAY: A BENEFIT CONCERT. The program will intertwine original jazz compositions with poetry by two of America's most prolific queer voices - James Baldwin and Tennessee Williams - with an original jazz score. CLOSET PLAY's cast will include Broadway's Gerry McIntyre along with Trenton Baker, Jos N. Banks, Christian Bufford, Robbin DaSilva, Ryan Lanning, Kimberly Lawson, David Robbins, Tiffany T. Taylor, Koray Tarhan, WIll Wilhelm, Jasmine Lacy Young, Joey Stone, Ricki J Pettinato, and Eustace J. Williams. CLOSET PLAY will premiere September 30, 2020, broadcasting from the Pride Arts Center's Buena Theatre at 7:00 pm on Facebook and YouTube; and available to stream thereafter. Links will be posted on the PrideArts Facebook page (www.facebook.com/pridefilmsandplays) and website (www.pridearts.org). There is no charge to view CLOSET PLAY, but donations will be gladly accepted.

Following BOX & COX in the fall Virtual Season will be the two-character one-act comedy A PAIR OF LUNATICS, by W.R. Walkes. In A PAIR OF LUNATICS, which premiered in London in 1898, He and She meet for the first time in an asylum and each mistakes the other for an inmate. A PAIR OF LUNATICS will be streamed twice only - on Thursdays, November 19, and December 3; at 7:00 pm each evening. The final play of the virtual fall season will be Anton Chekov's THE PROPOSAL, to be streamed twice only - on Thursday, December 17 and Wednesday, December 30; at 7:00 pm each evening. In this one-act Chekov comedy, Ivan, an hypochondriac, has a proposal for Natalya the neighbor. That is, if they can ever agree on anything. Casts of A PAIR OF LUNATICS and THE PROPOSAL will be announced later.

Costs to view are $25.00 for each of the three plays and tickets will be available at www.pridearts.org.

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