Cuba Gooding Jr. to Return to Broadway as Chicago's Billy Flynn
(© David Gordon)
The producers of Broadway's long-running Chicago have announced that Academy Award winner Cuba Gooding Jr. will join the cast as smooth-talking lawyer Billy Flynn for a limited engagement October 6-November 18. Gooding reprises the role, which he originated in the 2018 London production of Chicago, currently playing at the Phoenix Theatre.
Gooding's breakthrough role was as Tre Styles in the feature film Boyz n the Hood (1991), followed by A Few Good Men (1992), before winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor in Jerry Maguire (1996). His later films include As Good as It Gets (1997), Men of Honor (2000), Pearl Harbor (2001), American Gangster (2007), The Butler (2013), and Selma (2014). In 2016, he portrayed O.J. Simpson in the F/X drama series The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story, for which he received a Primetime Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie. In 2013, he made his Broadway debut alongside Cicely Tyson and Vanessa Williams in the Tony Award-nominated production of The Trip to Bountiful.
Chicago, now in its 22nd year on Broadway, currently stars Michelle DeJean as Roxie Hart, Terra C. MacLeod as Velma Kelly, John O'Hurley as Billy Flynn, Evan Harrington as Amos Hart, Cady Huffman as Matron "Mama" Morton, and R. Lowe as Mary Sunshine.
Directed by Tony Award winner Walter Bobbie and choreographed by Tony Award winner Ann Reinking, Chicago features a legendary book by Fred Ebb and Bob Fosse, music by John Kander, and lyrics by Fred Ebb.
Set amid the razzle-dazzle decadence of the 1920s, Chicago is the story of Roxie Hart, a housewife and nightclub dancer who murders her on-the-side lover after he threatens to walk out on her. Desperate to avoid conviction, she dupes the public, the media and her rival cellmate, Velma Kelly, by hiring Chicago's slickest criminal lawyer to transform her malicious crime into a barrage of sensational headlines, the likes of which might just as easily be ripped from today's tabloids.
