{"id":185558,"date":"2026-04-04T16:53:11","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T16:53:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/185558\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T16:53:11","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T16:53:11","slug":"get-a-1st-look-at-will-blum-john-treacy-egan-james-moye-elena-shaddow-in-1776-at-paper-mill-playhouse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/185558\/","title":{"rendered":"Get a 1st Look at Will Blum, John Treacy Egan, James Moye, Elena Shaddow in 1776 at Paper Mill Playhouse"},"content":{"rendered":"

Previews are underway\u00a0for the Paper Mill Playhouse<\/a>\u00a0production of the Tony-winning musical 1776<\/a>, which will officially open at the New Jersey venue April 5. Watch Will Blum<\/a>, who plays John Adams, lead “Sit Down, John” in the video above, and check out photos from the limited engagement, which continues through May 2, in the gallery below.<\/p>\n

Directed by Paper Mill Producing Artistic Director Mark S. Hoebee<\/a>, the cast is led by Blum (Beetlejuice<\/a>) as John Adams, John Treacy Egan<\/a> (Just in Time<\/a>) as Benjamin Franklin, Edward Watts<\/a> (Scandalous) as John Dickinson, James Moye<\/a> (Tootsie) as John Hancock, Elena Shaddow<\/a> (The Bridges of Madison County<\/a>) as Abigail Adams, Michael Burrell (Austen\u2019s Pride) as Thomas Jefferson, Jonathan Young (Les Mis\u00e9rables) as Edward Rutledge, Bryant Martin (Desperate Measures)
\n as Richard Henry Lee, Liz Leclerc as Martha Jefferson, and Praise
\nOranika as the Courier with Joey Birchler as Lewis Morris, Jonathan
\nChisolm as Samuel Chase, Peyton Crim (Huzzah!) as
\n Col. Thomas McKean, Aaron De Jesus as Robert Livingston<\/a>, Sam Faustine
\nas Dr. Lyman Hall, Philip Hoffman<\/a> as Stephen Hopkins, Alec Ludacka as
\nJames Wilson<\/a>, Kruz Maldonado as Leather Apron\/Painter, Tuck Milligan<\/a> as
\nAndrew McNair, Stanton Morales as George Read, Jay Russell<\/a> as Caesar
\nRodney, Bryan Seastrom as Dr. Josiah Bartlett, Paul Slade Smith<\/a> as
\n Rev. John Witherspoon, Graham Stevens<\/a> as Joseph Hewes, Price Waldman<\/a> as
\n Charles Thomson, and Branch Woodman<\/a> as Roger Sherman. Understudies are
\nNoah LaPook and Claire Leyden.<\/p>\n

Featuring a book by Peter Stone<\/a> and a score by Sherman Edwards<\/a>, the
\nmusical spans the two months ahead of the signing of the Declaration
\nof Independence as John Adams persuades his fellow Founding Fathers to
\nescape British rule, putting his own morality at stake.<\/p>\n

The original Broadway production won three 1969 Tony Awards,
\nincluding Best Musical, Best Featured Actor in a Musical (Ronald
\nHolgate), and Best Direction of a Musical (Peter Hunt<\/a>), and marked the
\nBroadway debut of Betty Buckley<\/a> in the role of Martha Jefferson.<\/p>\n

The Paper Mill\u00a0production also has musical staging by Nancy Ren\u00e9e Braun, music direction by Jillian Zack<\/a>, scenic design by Kevin Rupnik<\/a>,
\ncostume design by Leon Dobkowski<\/a>, lighting design by Amith
\nChandrashaker, sound design by Matt Kraus<\/a>, scenic coordination and
\nadditional design by Kelly James Tighe, hair and wig design by Ashley
\nRae Callahan, makeup design by Dena Olivieri,\u00a0and fight choreography by Rick Sordelet<\/a> with casting by
\nThe TRC Company<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Gary Mickelson<\/a> is the production stage manager.<\/p>\n

Visit PaperMill.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Previews are underway\u00a0for the Paper Mill Playhouse\u00a0production of the Tony-winning musical 1776, which will officially open at the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":185559,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[9,11,10,49,51,50],"class_list":{"0":"post-185558","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-york","8":"tag-new-york","9":"tag-new-york-headlines","10":"tag-new-york-news","11":"tag-new-york-state","12":"tag-new-york-state-headlines","13":"tag-new-york-state-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185558","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=185558"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/185558\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/185559"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=185558"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=185558"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=185558"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}