The eight recently announced 2024 inductees into the Theater Hall of Fame include one closely associated with August Wilson: veteran actor Stephen McKinley Henderson, who has been featured in four major August Wilson productions in New York and more elsewhere.
The 2024 honorees will be formally inducted on Nov. 18 in Broadway’s Gershwin Theatre, where their names will be added in gold to those honored since the Hall of Fame was founded in 1971. Each will be inducted by a theater colleague of their choice.
In addition to Henderson, they are:
• Elizabeth Ashley, an actor remembered for her Tony Award-winning performance in “Take Her, She’s Mine” and nomination garnering roles in “Barefoot in the Park” and a revival of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.”
• Charles Busch, an actor-playwright best known for his voluminous work off-off- and off-Broadway as playwright (and usually actor, often in drag) in dozens of his plays, including “Vampire Lesbians of Sodom,” “Psycho Beach Party,” “Die, Mommie, Die!” and “Tale of the Allergist’s Wife” (which moved to Broadway and received a Tony nomination).
• William Finn, a composer, lyricist and playwright famed for the Tony-winning “Falsettos” and “The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee.”
• Boyd Gaines, an actor whose Broadway career included roles in “The Heidi Chronicles,” “She Loves Me,” “Contact,” “Gypsy” and “Journey’s End.” He was the first man ever nominated for a Tony Award in all four acting categories (lead and supporting in both play and musical), winning in three.
• Todd Haimes, a prolific executive director and artistic director of the Roundabout Theatre from 1983 to 2023, which produced at three Broadway theaters and two off-Broadway. He died in 2023.
• Donna Murphy, an actor who won Tonys in “Passion” and a revival of “The King and I” and was nominated for “Wonderful Town,” “LoveMusik” and “The People in the Picture.”
• David Rabe, a playwright whose Broadway plays “Sticks and Bones,” “In the Boom Boom Room,” “Streamers” and “Hurlyburly” won one Tony and three nominations, and whose 17 plays, including “The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel,” had active lives off-Broadway and country-wide.
Henderson, a well-known character actor, has been a stalwart of the American stage for many decades. He started as part of the famed first student drama group at the Juilliard School, which include Kevin Kline and Patti LuPone. In recent years, he has been recognized for his Broadway and film work.
He has appeared in the Wilson plays “King Hedley II” (as Stool Pigeon in 2001), “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” (Slow Drag, 2003) and “Fences” (Bono, 2010).
The New York premiere of “Jitney” (Turnbo), which started at the Pittsburgh Public Theater in 1996, traveled the country, became an off-Broadway hit in 2000-01 and went on to win the Best New Play Olivier Award in London (2002). Pittsburghers may remember his richly comic, deeply felt portrait of the gossip jitney driver, Turnbo.
Henderson also has credits in five other Broadway shows, including “Between Riverside and Crazy” (2023), for which he was nominated for the leading role Tony, as he was for his featured role in “Fences,” opposite Denzel Washington. Henderson played that same role in the 2016 movie “Fences” and he has played significant roles in many other movies, such as “Lincoln” (2012) and “Dune” (2021).
However, movie roles aren’t considered for the Theater Hall of Fame. The minimum requirements are at least five major theater credits spread over a career of at least 25 years. The credits are not limited to Broadway, but can include off-Broadway or major professional companies around the country.
This year’s ballot included 42 nominations, voted on by members of the Hall of Fame and the American Theatre Critics/Journalists Association.
The induction ceremony will be produced by Terry Hodge Taylor. Not televised, it celebrates the theater community by attracting an audience primarily of colleagues and fans of those being inducted, along with other theater supporters.
Christopher Rawson, a longtime theater critic for the Post-Gazette, serves on the executive committee of the Theater Hall of Fame.
First Published: July 23, 2024, 9:30 a.m.
Updated: July 23, 2024, 6:56 p.m.
