Queen City Off-Broadway’s killer cast for August Wilson’s “Jitney” – Tony Davis, Reggie Willis, Daryl Hinton and more, set to open in New Stage Collective’s space in mid-October, is now on ice.
New Stage artistic director Alan Patrick Kenny “felt the turn-around time from the end of “Jitney” into (New Stage’s) “Caroline, or Change” would be too short and created too many logistical problems,” reports Queen City AD Lyle Benjamin.
Benjamin plans to move the production, about a gypsy cab company in 1970s Pittsburgh, to early 2008 at the Deaf Club of Greater Cincinnati (3938 Spring Grove. Ave., Northside) and “hope the cast holds together.”
“Jitney,” is the first of two Wilson shows being produced as a Queen City collaboration with Cincinnati Black Theatre Company. Benjamin will also move “Gem of the Ocean” out of New Stage, fearing the same problems with “Take Me Out.”
Queen City opens its season in October with the regional premiere of “The Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow” at Deaf Club.
Jackie Demaline
