NEW YORK (AP) — It's only fitting that Kecia Lewis had her most successful theater season while playing the role of mentor.
The Broadway veteran, who is celebrating 40 years in the business this year, stars in “Hell's Kitchen” as Ms. Liza Jane, the brilliant piano teacher who instills the joys of music in the show's young heroine.
“Sit down and learn,” she tells her new teenage student, whose character is modeled after Alicia Keys. The youngster looks at the older student at piano and says, “For the first time in my life, I see in her what I might become: strong, commanding, a queen.”
Lewis is a calm, no-nonsense, wisecracking figure who radiates skill, warmth and professionalism, helping rising star Murray Joy Moon make her Broadway debut in the title role.
“She's a simple, noble woman who brings a powerful sense of grounding to every room she walks into,” Moon says. “From my first conversation with her, I knew I wanted to learn as much as I could from her.”
It's a special spring for Lewis, whose musicals have been nominated for 13 Tony Awards and who received her first Tony nomination, and who has already won an Outer Critics Award and a Lucille Lortel Award.
“This is what I've always wanted to do since I was a kid. This is the only thing I've ever really been trained for,” she says. “Any other job would have felt fake. I love what I do. It doesn't feel like work.”
Lewis made her Broadway debut at age 18 in the mid-1980s in the original company of “Dreamgirls,” and went on to star in “The Gospel at Coronation” opposite Morgan Freeman, as well as “Big River,” “Ain't Misbehavin'” and “Once on This Island.”
The theater world nearly lost her: She left “Once on This Island” early and starred in a TV pilot that didn't work out, leaving her heartbroken. For six years she taught fifth and sixth grades, worked for a magazine and at a shelter for pregnant and homeless young women.
Her love of acting dogged her until she decided to return to auditions in 1991. She knew she was losing it, so she auditioned for parts she would never get, like a role in “The Sound of Music” at the Santa Barbara Civic Light Opera.
“I never thought anyone would want me to be in The Sound of Music, but then it happened. I got the role of the Mother Superior, and that was my start,” she says.
The Ventura County Star's critic was impressed: “As the Mother Superior, Lewis brought a frenzy out the lobby door in 'Climb Every Mountain,' with a well-timed intermission and a powerful closing performance from her song that will be second to none.”
The role led to some interesting roles in a string of Rodgers & Hammerstein shows, including “South Pacific” and “The King and I.” “And it became clear to me, 'Okay, you were meant to come back,'” she says.
Since her return, Lewis has appeared on Broadway in The Drowsy Chaperone, Chicago, Leap of Faith, Cinderella, and Child of a Lesser God, and off-Broadway in Mother Courage, The Skin of Our Teeth, and Marie and Rosetta. Her television credits include The Blacklist, Madame Secretary, Royal Pains, and Blue Bloods.
“I feel like I could write an encyclopedia about what I've done in this industry for 40 years,” she says.
Hell's Kitchen director Michael Greif had known Lewis from their work together on Big River and thought she would be perfect for the role of Miss Liza Jane.
“Keshia is a wonderful teacher both on and off stage,” Greif says, “and she brings a wealth of experience, wisdom and generosity to every encounter with Maria and our incredible ensemble, many of whom are making their Broadway debut.”
Lewis initially read the script without knowing that Keys' songs would be featured or that the teenager at the center of the film had ties to the Grammy Award winner.
The play is set in Manhattan Plaza, an apartment building in Manhattan's Hell's Kitchen neighborhood where Keys grew up, which offers affordable housing to people in the arts. The building also includes the Ellington Room, a multipurpose space with a piano, where in the musical the heroine meets Miss Liza Jane, a member of Keys' collective mentoring team.
Recommended articles
Lewis knows both the building and the room well: She went to high school nearby, one of her best friends lived at Manhattan Plaza, and she even sang in the Ellington Room at the memorial service for a friend's father.
Keys has worked personally with Lewis on two of her hits already released, “A Perfect Way to Die” and “Author of Forever,” and the team also paid for piano lessons to help her look her best in the role.
Lewis also related to the musical's coming-of-age story of a young woman and single mother navigating the tough streets of New York on a deeper level.
“I was a single mother with a son, who's 20 now and in New York, so I understood on a very personal level a lot of what she was saying and what she was trying to communicate. My mother brought all of that to me, along with what she gave me, and allowed me to stand on my own.”
