Cast (left to right): Rob Demery and Jade Payton.
The Alliance Theatre is excited to announce the cast of its upcoming production, The Mountaintop. Written by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Katori Hall (The Hot Wing King), The Mountaintop marks the second time the Alliance Theatre has produced a production written by Hall and is a gripping reimagining of the night before the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination. Directed by the Alliance Theatre’s Jennings Hertz Artistic Director Tinashe Kajese-Bolden, The Mountaintop runs on The Coca-Cola Stage, August 30 through September 22, 2024. Opening night is Friday, September 6, 2024.
Taking place on April 3, 1968, an exhausted Dr. King retires to his room at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis after delivering one of his most memorable speeches. When a mysterious young woman named Camae delivers room service, the two engage in humorous conversation that progresses into a soul-searching discussion about their mutual hopes and fears. When Camae reveals a secret, King is forced to confront his destiny and his legacy to his people.
“The Mountaintop engages with history and dreams about a new future. I wrote this piece from a place of skepticism. As a young African American who grew up in the South, who grew up in Memphis, Tennessee, specifically, which is the place that Dr. King was slain, I had questions,” said Playwright Katori Hall. “The conceit of this play…and the fantastical approach allows there to be some room for a kind of image deconstruction – not legacy deconstruction, but image deconstruction – that humanizes those we have placed on pedestals. It allows for us ordinary people to find the extraordinariness in ourselves, bringing King out of the clouds, off a pedestal, making him flesh and bone and blood instead of a statue. To me it makes him relatable and more accessible and, therefore, makes the things that he did, the things he achieved more accessible for us regular, degular human beings.”
The Mountaintop will feature Rob Demery (Broadway: A Soldier’s Play, TV/Lifetime: Robin Roberts Presents: Mahalia) as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and Jade Payton (Netflix: Glamorous) as Camae.
The creative team of The Mountaintop includes Director Tinashe Kajese-Bolden (The Preacher’s Wife), Set Designer Tony Cisek, Costume Designer Kara Harmon, Lighting Designer Ben Rawson, Sound Designer Melanie Chen Cole, Projections Designer Miko Simmons, and Projections Programmer Colby Nordberg.
Additional production support includes Stage Manager R. Lamar Williams, Assistant Stage Manager Barbara Gantt O’Haley, Assistant Stage Management Xiaonan Chloe Liu, Stage Management Production Assistant Samantha Honeycutt, and Production Management Lead Courtney O’Neill.
“This show is an opportunity to celebrate the majesty of the human will despite the flawed nature of our human condition,” said Director Kajese-Bolden. “We exist in a time where we prop our leaders up to unattainable standards, wanting them to be almost Christlike in perfection, which is detrimental for them - but worse - it’s paralyzing for us! We count ourselves out for fear we will never live up to the ideal. It was the scars of Dr. King that made him a great leader and this reimagining of his final night with an equally complicated, yet hopeful visitor, is the urgent reminder to awaken the leader within, grab the baton for change, and run the race ahead.”
Learn more about The Mountaintop.
