Fences announces additional cast

Additional casting is set for the first Broadway revival of Fences, the 1987 Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play by August Wilson, starring two-time Academy Award-winner Denzel Washington and featuring Tony Award-winner and Academy Award-nominee Viola Davis.

Fences, directed by Kenny Leon, will open at the Cort Theatre on 26 Apr 2010, following previews from 14 Apr, and will play a strictly limited 13-week engagement through to 11 Jul 2010.

In addition to Denzel Washington as 'Troy Maxson' and Viola Davis as 'Rose Maxson,' the cast will feature Chris Chalk (MTC's Ruined) as 'Cory,' Stephen McKinley Henderson (August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom & King Hedley II) as 'Jim Bono,' Russell Hornsby (ABC's "Lincoln Heights" & HBO's "In Treatment") as 'Lyons' and Mykelti Williamson (Fox's "24" & Forrest Gump) as 'Gabriel.' Casting for the role of 'Raynell' will be announced at a later date.

The production team for Fences will be announced soon.

Fences is one of the ten plays in August Wilson's sweeping Pittsburgh Cycle, focusing on the twentieth century African-American experience.

Set in the late 1950's the play tells the story of Troy Maxson (Denzel Washington), an embittered ex-con and former negro baseball player. Discrimiation stops Maxson from gaining promotion at work, and the resultant shame he feels for not being able to provide adequately for his family causes him to emotionally wihdraw from them.

The original Broadway production opened on 26 Mar 1987 at the 46th Street Theatre (now the Richard Rodgers Theatre), and played 525 regular performances. It was one of the most critically acclaimed and successful plays of the 1980s, winning four Tony Awards including Best Play, the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, three Drama Desk Awards, including Best Play and the NY Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play.