VIDEO PREVIEW: Ballroom Takes Center Stage in “Cats: The Jellicle Ball”

Robert “Silk” Mason (Magical Mister Mistoffeless) warming up for a preview of “CATS: The Jellicle Ball on Broadway” — Photo LMS

 

VIDEO PREVIEW: Ballroom Takes Center Stage in “Cats: The Jellicle Ball”

 https://f.io/VnF5WC1d (Video credit: CATS: The Jellicle Ball on Broadway).

At a private preview earlier this month for  “Cats: The Jellicle Ball,” I joined a small, curated group of journalists inside a 42nd Street rehearsal studio. I didn’t just watch the ballroom come alive — I felt it. The electricity in the room was real. It was clear this ensemble had gathered to do one thing, and one thing only — to slay.

If you’ve never stepped into a New York City LGBTQ+ ball and have always wanted to, “Cats: The Jellicle Ball” is your invitation. Previews begin March 18 at Broadway’s Broadhurst Theatre, where Andrew Lloyd Webber’s global phenomenon “Cats,” based on T.S. Eliot’s “Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats,” has been radically reimagined as an immersive ballroom competition.

This production arrives on Broadway with serious momentum. It premiered at the Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC) in 2024, where the reimagined staging smashed box-office records, extended multiple times, and earned raves from critics who hailed it as a thrilling reinvention rather than a nostalgic revival. Rob Weinert-Kendt, editor-in-chief of American Theatre, called “Cats: The Jellicle Ball” a “phenomenon,” language that has followed the show uptown as it prepares to take its place on the Great White Way.

At the preview, the assembled company delivered three numbers that demonstrated just how completely this production fuses Broadway craft with ballroom fire. Several legendary ballroom figures share the stage with seasoned theater veterans: Junior LaBeija of the House of LaBeija — whose voice helped define “Paris Is Burning” — appears as Gus; ballroom icon Leiomy Maldonado, widely known as the “Wonder Woman of Vogue,” stalks the stage as Macavity; “Tempress” Chasity Moore of the House of Maison Margiela brings raw pathos to Grizabella; and André De Shields presides with gravitas as Old Deuteronomy.

“Broadway meets Runway” is not just a marketing hook; it’s the show’s organizing principle. 

Directed by Obie Award winners Zhailon Levingston and Bill Rauch, with choreography by New York City ballroom legends Omari Wiles (House of NiNa Oricci) and Arturo Lyons (House of Miyake-Mugler), the production transforms the stage into a ballroom runway, complete with houses, categories, and the crackling tension of competition pulsing beneath every number. It’s pitched as “the fiercest event of the season,” a “sexy celebration of love and resilience,” and “the most exhilarating fun that can be had in the theater” — and based on that preview, none of it feels like hyperbole.

The casting deepens that sense of cultural fusion. Sydney James Harcourt (House of NiNa Oricci) channels rock-star charisma as Rum Tum Tugger, while Ken Ard, from the original 1982 Broadway cast of “Cats,” returns as DJ Griddlebone, reimagined as the sonic architect of the ball. Robert “Silk” Mason, as Magical Mister Mistoffelees, and Dava Huesca, as Rumpleteazer, round out a company that moves with the precision of trained dancers and the high-stakes bravado of ballroom competitors.

To understand why bringing ballroom into a mainstream Broadway musical feels so charged, a brief history is useful. New York’s ballroom culture traces its roots to the late 19th century, when Harlem’s Hamilton Lodge began hosting drag balls that are now recognized as some of the first of their kind in the United States. By the 1920s and 1930s, these events had grown into massive spectacles during the Harlem Renaissance, drawing thousands from across racial and class lines, even as the press and authorities condemned them as “perversion.”

In the decades that followed, queer and trans people of color — often pushed out of traditional pageant circuits — developed the house system, forming chosen families such as the Houses of LaBeija, Ninja, and Xtravaganza. These houses offered mentorship, shelter, and a sense of belonging to African American and Afro Latino LGBTQ+ youth. Within that context, ballroom birthed voguing and categories centered on “realness” and hyper-stylized performance. During the AIDS crisis of the 1980s, it became a vital space for care and community as the epidemic ravaged those same populations.

Fast forward to 2026, and staging ballroom-rooted work on Broadway carries its own politics. In a climate where the current administration has targeted transgender people and other marginalized communities through policy and rhetoric, a show like “Cats: The Jellicle Ball” — built on queer, African American, Latino, and Afro Latino forms of expression — reads as an unambiguous act of resilience. It also sends a quieter but equally powerful message: that anyone who wants to express their true selves, in whatever way feels comfortable and authentic, deserves space, safety, and celebration. What once survived as an underground lifeline now occupies a commercial theater on 44th Street, with a runway cutting through the house and onstage seating that places some audience members as close to the action as the journalists were at the press preview.

Afterward, I sat down with Junior LaBeija and André De Shields to talk about what this moment means. I found myself reaching back to something I was taught as a child.

“When I was a little girl, I was told never to use the word ‘hate’ because it means you want something not to exist,” I told them. “I hate injustice.”

De Shields paused, then locked eyes with me, leaning forward slightly in his elevated chair as though delivering a benediction.

“Hate is not an emotion,” he said. “Hate is a disease. And ‘Cats: The Jellicle Ball’ is its antidote.”