From left, co-book writer and original author Kwame Alexander, playwright and librettist Candrice Jones, musician and lyricist Christopher Jackson, and director Jade King Carroll discuss the creative development process for The Crossover Monday in the Amphitheater.
ARIANNA NEVAREZ
Staff Writer
At 10:45 a.m. Monday in the Amphitheater, Chautauqua Institution welcomed a cadre of artists spanning disciplines and areas of expertise to discuss a project that has long been in the works, but rarely in the public eye.
The Crossover is a work commissioned by Chautauqua Theater Company and is currently in development. The project — the first musical to be commissioned by CTC — is based on African American Heritage House Inaugural Distinguished Fellow and former Michael I. Rudell Director of Literary Arts Kwame Alexander’s wildly popular eponymous children’s book.
Alexander, Candrice Jones, Christopher Jackson and Jade King Carroll joined together on the Amphitheater stage for a conversation about their journeys and gave the audience a sneak peek into the musical processes of developing a production of this scale.
“Friction is necessary for art,” Jackson, the musical’s composer and co-lyricist, said. He opened by noting — in conjunction with the Week Five theme, “Art and Artists Against the Odds” — that most artists will struggle, yet challenges can help build a different lens on how hard times can lend themselves to growth. He said when he is facing adversity, he turns to the people around him.
“The perfect antidote to [adversity] is collaboration, because you’re not alone,” Jackson said. “There’s this idea that we don’t create anything by ourselves.”
The Crossover, based on Alexander’s book, which is written in verse, is about “intellectual and basketball phenomenon” Joshua Bell’s navigation of his family and sport.
Carroll, the producing artistic director of CTC and director of the musical, said she feels like now is the moment to tell this story. She said The Crossover is intergenerational and has so many different aspects of the show that bring people together, such as music, basketball and dance.
Looking at the business side, Jackson said this is a perfect time for this play because of basketball’s popularity, and current contexts have always influenced how people perceive stories. He said this play aims to “create a venue where people can come together.”
The Crossover novel was already made with music in mind. In college, Alexander said he was looking for a way to impress a girl, and as he was looking for a record to play for her, he found his dad’s old records. He discovered a different love: “beautiful jazz.”
When Alexander wrote The Crossover, he said he listened to the Pandora jazz station. One of Horace Silver’s most recognizable songs, “Filthy McNasty,” played and inspired a piece of his art: his protagonist’s nickname. Alexander said, “Jazz played a significant role in the creating of the text.”
Alexander brought up the Emmy Award-winning show “The Crossover,” which is based on the book. He talked about the difficulties presented after the season was not renewed. Alexander recalled that there was a “dichotomy” of feelings, from being hurt about the cancellation to experiencing the happiness of winning an Emmy.
“It’s not really rejection. It’s not really a mistake. It’s not really this thing that happens that is terrible,” Alexander said. “It’s an opportunity for you to learn something, and for you to get that ‘no’ out of the way so that the ‘yes’ can come.”
A couple of months after the cancellation, Alexander received a call from Carroll, who proposed commissioning and creating a musical adaptation of The Crossover at Chautauqua.
Jones, the musical’s playwright and librettist, initially interviewed for a position in “The Crossover” TV show, but she didn’t get the job. Once the idea of the musical became more concrete, Carroll called Jones to ask her if she was familiar with the project, unaware of her prior rejection.
While preparing for the interview for her current position, Jones said she re-read the book, fell in love all over again and let her imagination fly. After a rejection from the television adaptation, she said she still approached this opportunity with an open mind in her interview with Alexander.
“By the end of the conversation, I knew I was hired,” Jones said. “I knew that he saw something in me that he hadn’t seen before, and I knew that I was going to … give the story all the love, all the empathy, all the gratitude that it deserved. That’s a huge part of being an artist and moving forward past rejection. … You move forward with love and openness, humility and gratitude. Because if I had not done that, then I would not be sitting with you today.”
Jones established her career as an artist later in life, which allowed her to draw on more life experiences to use in storytelling, an understanding of how to navigate the creative world and a lack of fear of burnout. She said people are interested in the stories she wants to tell, but there is a fear of telling “certain stories” due to budget cuts and unstable funding.
“The stories that artists tell, what we put on the stage, affects those (artistic) decisions. So I don’t think it’s ever not going to be a hard time to create art,” Jones said. “But specifically, this is the time I’m living in right now, so I am living through the fear and also the perseverance of it.”
The creative team said conversations started in January 2024 about the future of the play. Now, they meet weekly to listen to new songs from the musical and analyze its structure. Carroll said musicals generally take 7–9 years, but this one is “being fast-tracked,” with the intention of being produced in 2028.
To give audiences a sneak peek, Jackson sang two songs from the musical: one a snippet of the music the team has been working on, and another an excerpt of something Jackson finished writing Friday.
In closing, the creative team talked more in-depth about the process for the play. Carroll said she didn’t want to “put anything down on paper too quickly,” allowing the piece to evolve and change in response to creative impulses and instincts. As these processes continue in the making of the musical, Jackson said having a group of collaborators can be special because one has people to lean on to make tough artistic decisions.
“It’s (the) best idea in the room wins. That’s the best way to go into a room with really smart people,” Jackson said. “ … The value of it is the perspective. There’s a level of humility that comes from sitting in a room with each other. I don’t want to have the best idea. I just want to have the right idea, or I want to support the right idea. If it didn’t come from me, agreeing with it is just as satisfying.”
