At the luncheon for the Olivier Award nominees, Dallas-born performer Cedric Neal poses with a bust of Sir Laurence Olivier as Henry V from his film, “Henry V.” The trophies themselves are smaller versions of the bust. / Cedric Neal
Actor-singer Cedric Neal gained acclaim in North Texas musical productions — from Fort Worth’s Jubilee Theater to the Dallas Theater Center, where he made his debut in 2008 in the title role of The Who’s Tommy. Now he’s acclaimed in England as well. He’s been nominated for an Olivier — London’s highest theater honor — for best supporting actor in a musical.
Living in England since 2014, Neal has gone from “Who’s the American?” to attending the awards ceremony this Sunday at the Royal Albert Hall — where he’ll join fellow nominees Sarah Jessica Parker, Joseph Fiennes and David Tennant.
Last year, Neal was given a stellar showcase in the Bridge Theatre’s revival of the classic 1950 musical, Guys and Dolls. Neal played Nicely-Nicely Johnson, a quiet, nervous nebbish among all the cardsharps and hustlers in Frank Loesser’s affectionate portrait of seedy New York City nightlife.
Nicely-Nicely is quiet, that is, until he unleashes what’s known as an “11 o’clock number.” That’s the song that comes late in a show and is designed to wake up an audience. Loesser created what is arguably the greatest 11 o’clock number in “Sit Down You’re Rockin’ the Boat” – a rousing tour-de-force delivered in a storefront church, where the gamblers have hid out to continue their dice game.
Speaking from England, where he lives now, Neal described Nicely-Nicely as “one of the most beloved characters in musical theater. And here comes me, this Black actor who infuses gospel in everything he does. And I thought, they’re not going to accept that.”
Previously, British directors had told Neal that — when it came to the kind of Black gospel singing he’s been doing since he was four years old in Oak Cliff — he needed to scale it back for London audiences.
But during rehearsals of Guys and Dolls, Neal said, he was pulled aside by the show’s music director, Tom Brady, and director Sir Nicholas Hytner, the former head of the Royal National Theater and the director of such shows as Miss Saigon and One Man, Two Guv’nors.
They told him, “we know who we hired,” Neal said. “The song was written to be a rousing, gospel number. Give us Cedric.”
So in the first verses, Neal sings “Sit Down” mostly straight. But then he uncorks his voice during the third — and it’s this revivalist fervor, as much as his expressive face and lively charm — that has gotten London audiences on their feet and Neal to his nomination.
The Voice as vehicle
Hytner and Brady may well have known of Neal’s singing abilities because of a calculated risk the actor took in 2019. He was invited to audition for the UK version of The Voice, the popular TV singing contest.
“It’s no secret, I’m a singer first,” he said. At Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing and Visual Arts in Dallas, Neal had studied singing, not theater.
“But my agent and I went back and forth. ‘Do we do this? Is it too commercial? Too risky? But it would be another way to elevate your profile.’ And I am so glad I did it.”
Neal was already known at least in London theater circles. In 2011, he left Dallas for New York. He snagged his first Broadway musical as an understudy to David Alan Grier as Sportin’ Life in The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess. (“I went on all of nine times,” Neal said with a laugh.)
But in 2014, when a production of The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess was getting ready for an outdoor production in London, Neal was cast. Before he could tell his then-fiancé Mitchell Darden-Kiever the news, Darden-Kiever told Neal that his risk management firm had just promoted him — to its headquarters in London.
Cedric Neal, center, as Sportin’ Life in The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess at Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre in London in 2014. Johan Persson / Regent’s Park Open Air Theatre
Finding acceptance
So moving to England was an easy choice. But even when Neal was entering the London theater scene already cast in a major show, gaining acceptance there, he found, was not easy.
And it was not so much because he’s Black, he explained. It’s because he’s American.
“I’m not going to lie,” Neal said. “It was tough. It was tough because for the longest time, I didn’t know how Americans were viewed in the theater world over here.”
American actors are often seen as poaching British jobs and then promptly returning home. It’s a mirror image of the resentment many American performers in New York feel about repeatedly being denied major titles roles on Broadway — because those parts have been precast with a famous British actor imported solely for that show. In London, Neal often heard other cast and crew members referring to him, not by name but as just “the American.”
But, he said, “when they realized I was staying, this was home, and I was doing the work, it changed.”
In addition to his Sportin’ Life in the outdoor Gershwin production, Neal made his West End debut as Berry Gordy in Motown: The Musical, performed in Chess at the London Coliseum and in a concert version of Jesus Christ Superstar.
Still, appearing on The Voice in 2019 would tell a lot more people that England was now his home. And that he’s a formidable singer.
Spoiler: On The Voice, Neal didn’t get past the semi-finals. But 8 million viewers of the telecast saw his bring-down-the-house audition with Stevie Wonder’s “Higher Ground.” And on YouTube, his performance has been viewed more than 3 million times.
His blazing, gospel-inflected rendition was notable for one judge, Oscar- and Grammy-winner Jennifer Hudson, taking off her boots during Neal’s performance and throwing one on stage, while shouting encouragement. (It’s a compliment, she later explained. It’s like a standing ovation.)
And in an uncommon feat, all four judges, including Sir Tom Jones and Will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas, signaled they wanted to be Neal’s coach. Jones held out the longest, he told Neal, because he’d performed with Wonder, “and if you could take a Stevie Wonder song and make it your own like that, then I know this guy’s a winner.”
An Olivier for Oak Cliff
Since that 2019 telecast, Neal has performed not only in Guys and Dolls but in the world premiere of the Back to the Future musical and has been cast in an upcoming 50th anniversary concert version of Pippin at the Theatre Royal Drury Lane.
By itself, Neal said, the Olivier nomination — even if he doesn’t win — demonstrates his acceptance by London theater. He gets choked up acknowledging that and acknowledging how much he owes Booker T. Washington High School as well as his fellow members of the Dallas Theater Center acting ensemble, notably Liz Mikel and Chamblee Ferguson.
“I would be nothing if it wasn’t for Dallas,” Neal said. “And I’m just proud to be representing not just Black American musical theater, but Dallas theater.”
Not that many Americans get past the nominations and actually win Olivier Awards. But if Neal does — as he said — he’ll certainly be the only Olivier Award winner from Oak Cliff.
- The Olivier Awards will be held Sunday in London’s Royal Albert Hall. Online, whatsonstage.com will show highlights after 4 pm Central Time.
