Angelica Ross is a star. If that wasn't clearly portrayed through her fierce performance as Candy in FX's popular series Pose, then it's undoubtably about to be shown again once she makes her Broadway debut starring as the famous Roxie Hart in Chicago this fall.
Per The Hollywood Reporter, not only is this role huge for Ross but it will also cement her status in history as the first "openly trans actress in the role, and among one of the first known trans actresses to star in a leading role in a Broadway musical."
Chicago will begin on Sep. 12 with an eight-week limited run and is set to take place at the Ambassador Theatre in New York. It is the second, longest-running show in Broadway history (Phantom of the Opera is the first according to Playbill.)
The news of Ross' role came on the same day as Brittney Griner's sentencing and the American Horror Story actress took to Twitter to express her bittersweet feelings:
This day is full of mixed feelings for me! I want to celebrate being on Broadway, but I don't feel like celebrating with #BrittneyGriner sentenced to 9 years in prison. This world is messed up. She doesn't deserve this.
"This day is full of mixed feelings for me! I want to celebrate being on Broadway, but I don't feel like celebrating with #BrittneyGriner sentenced to 9 years in prison. This world is messed up. She doesn't deserve this," Ross wrote.
Ross has long been outspoken on a variety of issues, specifically when it comes to the plight of trans folks and the LGBTQ+ community as a whole. In a recent interview with Raquel Willis for Interview Magazine, she talked about the importance of being a role model and outspoken figure:
I was born to show yet another example: a dark-skinned Black trans woman can show you how she can raise the vibrational frequency of her life to do something great for this world. It's not specifically that anybody can do what I'm doing, but it is that anybody can fully blossom. Whatever fragrance you're meant to bring into this world is what you're meant to bring into this world, and you have every opportunity to uproot yourself and replant yourself in an environment that is affirming to your growth.
She later added, "Even though things are really challenging, even though it seems like we take two steps forward and five steps back, we are still moving this thing forward and we're gaining the momentum with it, and it is going to be worth it. None of our work is going to be in vain. None of our sisters' and our brothers' lives who we have lost will be in vain. Their work, their lives, will mean something."