Broadway's 'Suffs' Brings Women's Suffrage To The Stage In Spectacular Style
The stars of Broadway’s “Suffs” this week teased the release of their forthcoming cast album with a televised performance of one of the new musical’s biggest showstoppers.
On Wednesday, actors Jenn Colella, Hannah Cruz and Nikki M. James dropped by NBC’s “Today” for a live rendition of “The March (We Demand Equality),” which was unveiled on streaming platforms earlier that day.
The “Today” performance also served as a belated celebration for the critical acclaim that “Suffs” has thus far received.
Last month, the musical nabbed six Tony Award nominations, including Best Musical and Best Featured Actress in a Musical for James. Actor-composer Shaina Taub, who also stars in the show, snagged a Best Original Score nod.
Regarding “The March (We Demand Equality)” specifically, Taub said she was “inspired by the great call-and-response tradition of protest chants” when writing the song.
Watch the “Today” performance of “The March (We Demand Equality)” below.
“I tried to capture both the thrill of using your outdoor voice in a group in the street, and the internal sense of belonging I’ve felt at so many marches,” she explained in an email statement. “I hope it inspires listeners to get loud for what they believe in, and have a good time with their friends while doing it.”
The full “Suffs” cast album will be released June 7 on streaming platforms.
Now playing at New York’s Music Box Theatre, “Suffs” is a musical take on the women’s suffrage movement and the ratification of the 19th amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which in 1920 recognized women’s right to vote. The show opened on Broadway this spring after an acclaimed 2022 run at New York’s Public Theater, the birthplace of “Hamilton” and “A Chorus Line,” among other smash musicals.
Taub, a rising star on the New York theater scene, portrays suffragist Alice Paul, alongside Colella, Cruz and James as fellow real-life women’s rights activists Carrie Chapman Catt, Inez Mulholland and Ida B. Wells, respectively. The show’s producers include former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and Nobel Peace Prize-winning human rights and education activist Malala Yousafzai.
Given the heated discourse surrounding the 2024 U.S. presidential election, “Suffs” feels more timely than ever ― a point which Clinton herself acknowledged in a March interview with CBS News.
“I think any conversation about getting people to vote, how it took so long for women to get the right to vote, how you should not throw away [or] ignore the power of your vote, I think all of that is good,” she said. “This is so meaningful, and truly historic, because women’s history doesn’t get told in a way that’s accessible and so exciting and true.”
