Never Be King

Grantors

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Sponsors

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Donors

Tributes

Performers

Benny Elledge

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Antoine de Bourbon

Audrey Hare

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Company

Tomás Matos

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Henry III

Chris McCarrell

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Henry of Navarre

Veronica Otim

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Marguerite de Valois

Wren Rivera

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Jaq

Talia Suskauer

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Gabrielle d’Estrées

Stephanie Torns

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Jeanne d'Albret

Setting

Songs & Scenes

One Act (No Intermission)

“Never Be King”

Benny Elledge, Stephanie Torns, Company

“Rock Song”

Chris McCarrell, Company

“Woman of Your Dreams”

Wren Rivera, Chris McCarrell, Talia Suskauer

“On My Mind”

Veronica Otim

“The War of Three Henries”

Benny Elledge, Tomás Matos, Chris McCarrell, Company

“Some Days”

Chris McCarrell, Talia Suskauer, Company

“I’m Coming In”

Talia Suskauer, Company

“I Will Be Here”

Wren Rivera

“If I Wrote this Story”

Talia Suskauer

“So What?”

Veronica Otim, Company

Production Staff

No items found.

Venue Staff

School Administration Staff

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Musicians

Music Director, Piano

Sam Columbus

Guitar

Michael Herlihy

Drums

Jesse-Ray Leich

Bass

Sean Murphy

Cello

Caitlin Thomas

Board Members

Student Advisory Board

Credits

Lighting equipment from PRG Lighting, sound equipment from Sound Associates, rehearsed at The Public Theater’s Rehearsal Studios. Developed as part of Irons in the Fire at Fault Line Theatre in New York City.

Special Thanks

*Appearing through an Agreement between this theatre and Actors’ Equity Association, the Union of Professional Actors and Stage Managers in the United States.

“Actors’ Equity Association (“Equity”), founded in 1913, is the U.S. labor union that represents more than 51,000 actors and stage managers, Equity fosters the art of live theatre as an essential component of society and advances the careers of its members by negotiating wages, improving working conditions and providing a wide range of benefits, including health and pension plans. Actors’ Equity is a member of the AFL-CIO and is affiliated with FIA, an International organization of performing arts unions. www.actorsequity.org

United Scenic Artists ● Local USA 829 of the I.A.T.S.E represents the Designers & Scenic Artists for the American Theatre

ATPAM, the Association of Theatrical Press Agents & Managers (IATSE Local 18032), represents the Press Agents, Company Managers, and Theatre Managers employed on this production.

About the Show

HENRY of NAVARRE was never supposed to be the king of France—but he saw his f*cking opportunity and took it. Wouldn’t you?

Never Be King is a Baroque meets pop-punk, Stratocaster meets harpsichord musical that tells the same story two different ways across two acts. Y2K pop-punk bangers inspired by Blink-192, Avril Lavigne, and more live alongside 16th Century chorales in a story that lives and dies by contrast: happenstance vs. opportunity, luck vs. plan, history vs. conspiracy.

After all, history’s just a he-said, she-said.

Meet the Cast

Benny Elledge

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Antoine de Bourbon

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Pronouns:

Audrey Hare

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Company

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Tomás Matos

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Henry III

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Chris McCarrell

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Henry of Navarre

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Pronouns:

Veronica Otim

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Marguerite de Valois

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Pronouns:

Wren Rivera

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Jaq

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Pronouns:

they/them

Talia Suskauer

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Gabrielle d’Estrées

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Pronouns:

Stephanie Torns

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Jeanne d'Albret

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Meet the Team

Charlie H. Ray

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Book, Music, Lyrics

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Sam Columbus

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Music, Orchestrations, Arrangement

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Media

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2021 National Touring Cast

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Second Stage Theater Announces 2025-2026 Season

Emily Wyrwa

June 3, 2025

Acclaimed playwright Jordan Harrison will make his Broadway debut with the 2015 Pulitzer finalist play Marjorie Prime at the Hayes Theater as part of Second Stage Theater’s 2025-2026 season. The play, which examines aging, artificial intelligence, memory, and mortality, will begin previews on Nov. 20 and officially open on Dec. 8.

The Second Stage Broadway season will also feature the Broadway debut of Gina Giofriddo's play Becky Shaw, which was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in 2009. The dark comedy tells the story of a blind date gone off the rails, examining sex, ethics, and love. The production, which will be directed by Trip Cullman, will begin previews March 18, 2026 and officially open on April 8, 2026.

The season marks Evan Cabnet’s first as Artistic Director. He said he’s been a fan of Second Stage since he moved to New York at 18 years old, and is proud of the season the company is mounting.

“To lead such a storied and venerated organization into its new chapter — honoring its extraordinary past, looking ahead to its bright future — is the opportunity and honor of a lifetime. I cannot wait to see you at the theater this fall,” Cabnet said in a statement.

The season’s Off-Broadway offerings will begin with the world premier of historical drama Meet the Cartozians by Talene Monahon. The play will be directed by Tony Award-winner David Cromer, who is currently nominated for the 2025 Tony Award Best Direction of a Musical for Dead Outlaw. It will begin previews at the Pershing Square Signature Center on Oct. 29 and officially open on Nov. 18.

On Feb. 11, 2026 — with official opening on Feb. 25, 2026 — Meat Suit, or the shitshow of motherhood will begin performances on the Irene Diamond Stage at the Pershing Square Signature Center. The play is written and directed by Aya Ogawa.

Adam Bock will make his return to Second Stage with a new production of his 2007 black comedy The Receptionist, a dark comedy about bureaucracy at work. The play will begin previews in mid-April at the Pershing Square Signature Center.

BEETLEJUICE Returns to Broadway This Fall

Emily Wyrwa

June 3, 2025

Say it three times, and he’s back on Broadway! Beetlejuice will make its return to the Broadway stage at the Palace Theatre for a limited 13-week engagement from Oct. 8, 2025 to Jan. 3, 2026. The First National Tour of the popular musical will reach its final resting place on the great white way. Tickets go on sale Tuesday June 3 at 10 a.m.

The show had two unconventional runs on Broadway in 2019 — where it played to standing-room-only sold out audiences at the Winter Garden Theatre — and post-pandemic in 2022. It’s known to have brought a new audience to Broadway via social media (especially TikTok). The First National Tour of Beetlejuice has broken records and played theatres all across North America for three years. In addition to that production, Beetlejuice has slayed audiences in Tokyo, Seoul, Melbourne, and will soon open in Sydney.

Beetlejuice is directed by Tony Award winner Alex Timbers. It features an original score by Eddie Perfect, book by Scott Brown and Anthony King, choreography by Connor Gallagher, music supervision and orchestrations by Kris Kukul, and scenic design by David Korins.

Based on Tim Burton’s dearly beloved film of the same name, Beetlejuice tells the story of a strange and unusual teenager, Lydia Deetz, whose life changes when she meets a recently deceased couple and a demon with a thing for stripes. Under its uproarious surface (six feet under, to be exact), it’s a remarkably touching show about family, love, and making the most of every Day-O!

The cast of the First National Tour features Justin Collette as the titular Beetlejuice, Madison Mosley as Lydia, Megan McGinnis as Barbara, Will Burton as Adam, Jesse Sharp as Charles, and Sarah Litzsinger as Delia.

Beetlejuice runs at the Palace Theatre from Oct. 8, 2025 to Jan. 3, 2026. For tickets and more information, visit here.

Lincoln Center Theatre Announces 2025-2026 Season

Emily Wyrwa

June 2, 2025

Lincoln Center Theater’s 2025-2026 season is set — and stacked. Kara Young and Kerry Washington will take the stage in a series of monologues written by Whoopi Goldberg as part of Lincoln Center Theater’s 2025-2026 season. The season marks the first full for new artistic director Lear deBessonet, who directed this season’s Once Upon a Mattress and the hit Into the Woods revival at New York City Center.

‍The Whoopi Monologues, directed by Whitney White, begins previews Off-Broadway at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater on July 7, 2026, with opening night set for July 14, 2026. Young and Washington will lead an ensemble of five women in bringing back iconic characters from Goldberg’s 1984 one-woman show.

On Broadway at the Vivian Beaumont Theatre, deBessonet will direct Ragtime, based on the 1975 novel of the same name with a book by Terrence McNally, music by Stephen Flaherty, and lyrics by Lynn Ahrens. Ragtime will star Caissie Levy, Joshua Henry, Brandon Uranowitz, and Shaina Taub. The production begins previews on Sept. 26, 2025 and opens on Oct. 16.

The season will also feature Kyoto, a new play written by Joe Murphy and Joe Robertson at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater. The play, which begins previews on Oct. 8, 2025 and opens Nov. 3, 2025, about the 1997 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, where American oil lobbyist Don Pearlman stood in the way of an agreement.

For the holidays, Grammy and Olivier Award-winning opera star Joyce DiNotano will star in the family opera Amahl and the Night Visitors. It marks the first seasonal family offering in Lincoln Center Theater history, and will be presented in association with the Metropolitan Opera. The production will run from Dec. 16 to Jan. 4, 2026 at the Mitzi E. Newhouse Theater.

At the Claire Tow Theater, screen’s Jenny Slate will take the stage in The Comedy Series, LCT3 and Seaview will come together to present a night of standup-meets-storytelling. It will begin performances in October, 2025.

‍Night Side Songs, a folk musical about how song heals us and empowers the human spirit, will begin performances at the Claire Tow Theater on Feb. 14, 2026, with opening night set for March 2, 2026.

On May 16, 2026, A Woman Among Women will begin previews, with opening set for June 1, 2026. The play tells the story of a founder of a women’s wellness center who holds court in her backyard, threatening to destroy the community she’s worked hard to build as her family and friends pass through.

Additionally, LTC will present a new reading series, where six playwrights will bring a one-night-only staged reading to the Lincoln Center stage. The dates for the readings will be announced.

“I am honored to welcome these beautiful artists to Lincoln Center Theater, and to roll out the red carpet for audiences next year in my first season as Artistic Director,” deBessonet said in a statement. “The richness and range of work speaks to theater as a place for wonder, truth, and heart—a place where democracy thrives, and we can experience a restored sense of human connection. I’m excited for all that is to come, and grateful to steward this magnificent theater into its next glorious chapter.”

Theatrely News

EXCLUSIVE: Watch A Clip From THEATER CAMP Starring Ben Platt, Noah Galvin, and Molly Gordon

Theatrely News

READ: An Excerpt From Sean Hayes Debut YA Novel TIME OUT

Theatrely News

"Reframing the COVID-19 Pandemic Through a Stage Manager’s Eyes"

EXCLUSIVE: Watch A Clip From THEATER CAMP Starring Ben Platt, Noah Galvin, and Molly Gordon

By: Maia Penzer

14 July 2023

Finally, summer has arrived, which can only mean one thing: it's time for camp! Theater Camp, that is. Theatrely has a sneak peak at the new film which hits select theaters today.

The new original comedy starring Tony Award winner Ben Platt and Molly Gordon we guarantee will have you laughing non-stop. The AdirondACTS, a run-down theater camp in upstate New York, is attended by theater-loving children who must work hard to keep their beloved theater camp afloat after the founder, Joan, falls into a coma.

The film stars Ben Platt and Molly Gordon as Amos Klobuchar and Rebecca-Diane, respectively, as well as Noah Galvin as Glenn Wintrop, Jimmy Tatro as Troy Rubinsky, Patti Harrison as Caroline Krauss, Nathan Lee Graham as Clive DeWitt, Ayo Edebiri as Janet Walch, Owen Thiele as Gigi Charbonier, Caroline Aaron as Rita Cohen, Amy Sedaris as Joan Rubinsky, and Alan Kim as Alan Park.

Theater Camp was directed by Molly Gordon and Nick Lieberman and written by Noah Galvin, Molly Gordon, Nick Lieberman & Ben Platt. Music is by James McAlister and Mark Sonnenblick. On January 21, 2023, Theater Camp had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival.

You can purchase tickets to the new film from our friends at Hollywood.com here.

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READ: An Excerpt From Sean Hayes Debut YA Novel TIME OUT

By: Kobi Kassal

29 May 2023

Actor Sean Hayes is what we in the biz call booked and blessed. On top of his Tony-nominated performance as Oscar Levant in Good Night, Oscar, Hayes has partnered with Todd Milliner and Carlyn Greenwald for the release of their new YA novel Time Out.

Heralded by many as Heartstopper meets Friday Night Lights, Time Out follows hometown basketball hero Barclay Elliot who decides to use a pep rally to come out to his school. When the response is not what he had hoped and the hostility continually growing, he turns to his best friend Amy who brings him to her voting rights group at school. There he finds Christopher and… you will just have to grab a copy and find out what happens next. Luckily for you, Time Out hits shelves on May 30 and to hold you over until then we have a special except from the book just for Theatrely:

The good thing about not being on the team the past two weeks has been that I’ve had time to start picking up shifts again at Beau’s diner and save up a little for college now that my scholarship dreams are over.

The bad part is it’s the perfect place to see how my actions at the pep rally have rotted the townspeople’s brains too.

During Amy’s very intense musical theater phase in middle school, her parents took her to New York City. And of course she came back home buzzing about Broadway and how beautiful the piss smell was and everything artsy people say about New York. But she also vividly described some diner she waited three hours to get into where the waitstaff would all perform songs for the customers as a way to practice for auditions. The regulars would have favorite staff members and stan them the way Amy stans all her emo musicians.

Working at Beau’s used to feel kind of like that, like I was part of a performance team I didn’t know I signed up for. The job started off pretty basic over the summer—I wanted to save up for basketball supplies, and Amy worked there and said it was boring ever since her e-girl coworker friend graduated. But I couldn’t get through a single lunch rush table without someone calling me over and wanting the inside scoop on the Wildcats and how we were preparing for the home opener, wanting me to sign an article in the paper or take a photo. Every friendly face just made the resolve grow inside me. People love and support the Wildcats; they would do the same for me.

Yeah, right.

Now just like school, customers have been glaring at me, making comments about letting everyone down, about being selfish, about my actions being “unfortunate,” and the tips have been essentially nonexistent. The Wildcats have been obliterated in half their games since I quit, carrying a 2–3 record when last year we were 5–0, and the comments make my feet feel like lead weights I have to drag through every shift.

Today is no different. It’s Thursday, the usual dinner rush at Beau’s, and I try to stay focused on the stress of balancing seven milkshakes on one platter. A group of regulars, some construction workers, keep loudly wondering why I won’t come back to the team while I refuse proper eye contact.

One of the guys looks up at me as I drop the bill off. “So, what’s the deal? Does being queer keep ya from physically being able to play?”

They all snicker as they pull out crumpled bills. I stuff my hands into my pockets, holding my tongue.

When they leave, I hold my breath as I take their bill.

Sure enough, no tip.

“What the fuck?” I mutter under my breath.

“Language,” Amy says as she glides past me, imitating the way Richard says it to her every shift, and adds, “even though they are dicks.” At least Amy’s been ranting about it every free chance she gets. It was one thing when the student body was being shitty about me leaving the team, but the town being like this is even more infuriating. She doesn’t understand how these fully grown adults can really care that much about high school basketball and thinks they need a new fucking hobby. I finally agree with her.

[She’s wearing red lipstick to go with her raccoon-adjacent eyeliner as she rushes off to prepare milkshakes for a pack of middle schoolers. I catch her mid–death glare as all three of the kids rotate in their chairs, making the old things squeal. My anger fades a bit as I can’t help but chuckle; Amy’s pissed-off reaction to Richard telling her to smile more was said raccoon makeup, and her tolerance for buffoonery has been at a negative five to start and declining fast.

I rest my arms on the counter and try not to look as exhausted as I feel.

“Excuse me!” an old lady screeches, making me jump.

Amy covers up a laugh as I head to the old lady and her husband’s table. They’ve got finished plates, full waters. Not sure what the problem is. Or I do, which is worse.

“Yes?” I say trying to suppress my annoyance.

“Could you be bothered to serve us?”

Only five more hours on shift. I have a break in three minutes. I’ll be with Devin at Georgia Tech tomorrow. “I’m sorry, ma’am,” I say, so careful to keep my words even, but I can feel my hands balling into fists. “What would you—?”

And suddenly Amy swoops in, dropping two mugs of coffee down. “Sorry about that, you two,” she says, her voice extra high. “The machine was conking out on us, but it’s fine now.”

Once the coffee is down, she hooks onto a chunk of my shirt, steering us back to the bar.

“Thanks,” I mutter, embarrassed to have forgotten something so basic. Again.

“Just keep it together, man,” she says. “Maybe you’d be better off with that creepy night shift where all the truckers and serial killers come in.”

Honestly, at least the serial killers wouldn’t care about my jump shot.

It’s a few minutes before my break, but clearly I need it. “I’ll be in the back room.”

Right before I can head that way though, someone straight-up bursts into the diner and rushes over to me at the bar. It’s a middle-aged dad type, sunburned skin, beer belly, and stained T-shirt.

“Pickup order?” I ask.

“You should be ashamed,” he sneers at me. He has a really strong Southern accent, but it’s not Georgian. “Think you’re so high and mighty, that nothing’ll ever affect you? My kid’ll never go to college because of you and your lifestyle. Fuck you, Barclay Ell—”

And before this man can finish cursing my name, Pat of all people runs in, wide-eyed in humiliation. “Jesus, Dad, please don’t—”

I pin my gaze on him, remembering how he cowered on the bench as Ostrowski went off, how he didn’t even try to approach me. “Don’t even bother,” I snap.

I shove a to-go bag into his dad’s arms, relieved it’s prepaid, and storm off to the break room.]

Amy finds me head in my arms a minute or two later. I look up, rubbing my eyes. “Please spare me the pity.”

She snorts and hands me a milkshake. Mint chocolate chip. “Wouldn’t dare.” She takes a seat and rolls her shoulders and neck, cracks sounding through the tiny room. “Do you want a distraction or a shoulder to cry on?”

For more information, and to purchase your copy of Time Out, click here.

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Reframing the COVID-19 Pandemic Through a Stage Manager’s Eyes

By: Kaitlyn Riggio

5 July 2022

When the COVID-19 pandemic was declared a national emergency in the United States in March 2020, Broadway veteran stage manager Richard Hester watched the nation’s anxiety unfold on social media.

“No one knew what the virus was going to do,” Hester said. Some people were “losing their minds in abject terror, and then there were some people who were completely denying the whole thing.”

For Hester, the reaction at times felt like something out of a movie. “It was like the Black Plague,” he said. “Some people thought it was going to be like that Monty Python sketch: ‘bring out your dead, bring out your dead.’”

While Hester was also unsure about how the virus would unfold, he felt that his “job as a stage manager is to naturally defuse drama.” Hester brought this approach off the stage and onto social media in the wake of the pandemic.

“I just sort of synthesized everything that was happening into what I thought was a manageable bite, so people could get it,” Hester said. This became a daily exercise for a year. Over two years after the beginning of the pandemic, Hester’s accounts are compiled in the book, Hold Please: Stage Managing A Pandemic. Released earlier this year, the book documents the events of the past two years, filtering national events and day-to-day occurrences through a stage manager’s eyes and storytelling.

When Hester started this project, he had no intention of writing a book. He was originally writing every day because there was nothing else to do. “I am somebody who needs a job or needs a structure,” Hester said.

Surprised to find that people began expecting his daily posts, he began publishing his daily writing to his followers through a Substack newsletter. As his following grew, Hester had to get used to writing for an audience. “I started second guessing myself a lot of the time,” Hester said. “It just sort of put a weird pressure on it.”

Hester said he got especially nervous before publishing posts in which he wrote about more personal topics. For example, some of his posts focused on his experiences growing up in South Africa while others centered on potentially divisive topics, such as the 2020 election and the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

Despite some of this discomfort, Hester’s more personal posts were often the ones that got the most response. The experience offered him a writing lesson. “I stopped worrying about the audience and just wrote what I wanted to write about,” Hester said. “All of that pressure that I think as artists we put on ourselves, I got used to it.”

One of Hester’s favorite anecdotes featured in the book centers on a woman who dances in Washington Square Park on a canvas, rain or shine. He said he was “mesmerized by her,” which inspired him to write about her. “It was literally snowing and she was barefoot on her canvas dancing, and that seems to me just a spectacularly beautiful metaphor for everything that we all try and do, and she was living that to the fullest.”

During the creation of Hold Please, Hester got the unique opportunity to reflect in-depth on the first year of the pandemic by looking back at his accounts. He realized that post people would not remember the details of the lockdown; people would “remember it as a gap in their lives, but they weren’t going to remember it beat by beat.”

“Reliving each of those moments made me realize just how full a year it was, even though none of us were doing anything outside,” he adds. “We were all on our couches.” Readers will use the book as a way to relive moments of the pandemic’s first year “without having to wallow in the misery of it,” he hopes.

“I talk about the misery of it, but that’s not the focus of what I wrote... it was about hope and moving forward,” Hester said. “In these times when everything is so difficult, we will figure out a way to get through and we will move forward.”

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