Cast Set For SHOW/BOAT: A RIVER at NYU Skirball

Casting has been announced for the Obie Award-winning Target Margin Theater’s world premiere production of Show/Boat: A River, presented by NYU Skirball in partnership with the 2025 Under the Radar Festival, running January 9–26, 2025 at NYU Skirball. Show/Boat: A River is a daring reconsideration of the seminal musical Show Boat, featuring an ensemble cast of ten actors playing multiple roles.

Directed by Target Margin Theater’s Founding Artistic Director David Herskovits, this bold adaptation reframes the original 1927 book and score by Jerome Kernand Oscar Hammerstein II for today’s audience, challenging us to confront our past and envision a reimagined America for 2025.

The cast includes Alvin Crawford, Caitlin Nasema Cassidy, Suzanne Darrell, Edwin Joseph, J Molière, Steven Rattazzi, Rebbekah Vega-Romero andStephanie Weeks (two more TBA). 

David Herskovits said, “As with all Target Margin shows over the past 34 years, Show/Boat: A River is a true, ensemble-driven production. We are not simply staging a 100-year-old classic, but recreating Show Boat, a famously unresolved work, for today's audiences with a slew of contemporary considerations, especially when it comes to casting. While certain key roles will have dedicated performers, everyone in the ensemble will take on different moments, songs, text and then let them go, sometimes very rapidly. Words and music will be shared fluildly in this process. I believe this approach allows us to truly reconsider who we are as a nation and as human beings.”

Show Boat, based on the 1926 novel by Edna Ferber, is both a powerful narrative and a historical reflection, revealing a legacy marked by violent racism while striving for a more just America. The work explores America’s transformation from the 1880s through the Jazz Age —journeying from steamboats to airplanes, vaudeville to radio, and the Spanish-moss South to the bustling city of Chicago amid the Great Migration.

Show Boat forever changed the face of American theater. The first show to integrate its music and plot, Show Boat presented complex characters grappling with timely, realistic themes woven into a substantial plot. Its epic narrative concerns the lives, loves and heartbreaks of three generations of show folk and their lifelong friends on the Mississippi, in Chicago and on Broadway.

Show Boat opened on Broadway on December 27, 1927, produced by Florenz Ziegfeld.  Show Boat’s glorious songs include “Ol’ Man River,” “Can't Help Lovin' Dat Man,” “Make Believe” and “Why Do I Love You?” The show was a critical and popular success, running for a total of 572 performances. Show Boat returned to Broadway no less than six times and has been made into three films.

The creative team for Show/Boat: A River includes Dionne McClain-Freeney (musical director/vocal arranger), Dan Schlosberg (musical director/orchestrator), Caroline Fermin (choreography), Kaye Voyce (scenic design), Dina El-Aziz (costume design), Cha See (lighting design), Ryan Gohsman (production stage manager), Daria Walcott (production manager)  and Adam M. Kassim (assistant director). 

Herskovits’ vision for this quintessential American masterpiece builds on Target Margin’s critically acclaimed history of examining and re-inventing classical works such as Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus, DuBose Heyward's Mamba’s Daughters, Goethe’s Faust, and Eugene O'Neill's Mourning Becomes Electra, to name a few. On the cusp of Show Boat's centennial, this new staging showcases Target Margin’s signature extravagant theatricality, intricate design layers, and a vibrant celebration of language, song, and spirit.

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