Theater News

Ariana DeBose, Lesli Margherita, and More Join Broadway Bares: Game Night

Matt Bomer, Andrew Rannells, and more ”Boys in the Band” will also be special guests at the annual Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS event.

Ariana DeBose will be a guest performer at Broadway Bares: Game Night.
Ariana DeBose will be a guest performer at Broadway Bares: Game Night.
(© David Gordon)

The lineup of special guests and performers has been announced for Broadway Bares: Game Night, taking place at 9:30pm and midnight on Sunday, June 17, at the Hammerstein Ballroom.

The show’s special guests will include Matt Bomer, Charlie Carver, Robin De Jesús, Andrew Rannells, Michael Benjamin Washington, and Tuc Watkins from the Broadway revival of The Boys in the Band.

Among the scheduled guest performers are Summer: The Donna Summer Musical‘s Ariana DeBose, The Phantom of the Opera‘s Jay Armstrong Johnson, Escape to Margaritaville‘s Alison Luff and Rema Webb, recent Kinky Boots star Kirstin Maldonado, Lesli Margherita, Mean Girls‘s Ashley Park, The Lion King‘s L. Steven Taylor, and SpongeBob SquarePants‘s Wesley Taylor. Judith Light will make a special appearance.

They’ll join more than 200 other dancers, including cast members from Anastasia, Angels in America, A Bronx Tale — The Musical, Escape to Margaritaville, Frozen, Hamilton, Hello, Dolly!, Kinky Boots, The Lion King, Mean Girls, My Fair Lady, The Phantom of Opera, Pretty Woman: The Musical, SpongeBob SquarePants, Summer: The Donna Summer Musical, and Wicked.

Broadway Bares: Game Night will be directed by Nick Kenkel and Laya Barak. Aaron Hamilton serves as associate director.

The show was created in 1992 by Jerry Mitchell, then a Broadway dancer, as a way to raise awareness and money for those living with HIV/AIDS. In Broadway Bares‘s first year, Mitchell and six of his friends danced in a New York City bar and raised $8,000. The 2017 edition raised $1,568,114 for the organization, bringing the 27-year grand total to more than $17.4 million.