When Taraji P. Henson first appears onstage in the 2026 revival of Joe Turner\u2019s Come and Gone<\/em>, she\u2019s met with lengthy, rapturous applause. It delights her every time.<\/p>\n \u201cIt moves me to tears,\u201d Henson says. \u201cIt\u2019s just so overwhelming because this is not a movie theater. Broadway is a destination. It\u2019s not, \u2018Oh, I\u2019m gonna go to the AMC in Sherman Oaks\u2019 or, \u2018I\u2019m gonna meet my girls at the AMC in Beverly Hills.\u2019 You have to come to New York. And people are coming\u2014they\u2019re flying, they\u2019re traveling in buses, they\u2019re caravanning to see little old me, this girl from southeast D.C. who just had a dream.\u201d<\/p>\n At the Ethel Barrymore Theatre, Henson is making her Broadway debut as Bertha Holly, a woman running a cozy Pittsburgh boardinghouse with her husband, Seth (Cedric the Entertainer), in 1911, during the Great Migration. There, lost souls like the mysterious Herald Loomis (Joshua Boone) seek refuge and reckon with their complicated pasts.<\/p>\n Henson describes Bertha as \u201cthe glue\u201d of the operation: Though she doesn\u2019t have any children, she\u2019s a devoted maternal figure to her boarders, doing everything in her power to make them feel at home\u2014whether that\u2019s by making them soulful home-cooked meals or lending a nonjudgmental listening ear.<\/p>\n \u201cBertha is the moral compass and the North Star,\u201d Henson says. \u201cShe talks about love and laughter during a very dark time. The Great Migration was full of hope, but a lot of people didn\u2019t make it. It wasn\u2019t easy coming up north. People were searching for lost family members, reconnecting with their spirituality and identity, and trying to find some sense of freedom. A lot was going on, but when you come to the Holly house, you\u2019re gonna get fed. You\u2019re gonna get loved on.\u201d<\/p>\n Cedric the Entertainer and Taraji P. Henson in Joe Turner\u2019s Come and Gone<\/em>.<\/p>\n <\/span>Photo: Julieta Cervantes<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n The role arrived at just the right time. Debbie Allen, the play\u2019s director, called Henson, \u201cand I said yes right away.\u201d She\u2019d been approached about Broadway roles before\u2014among them, Shug Avery in The Color Purple<\/em>\u2014but other projects had always stood in the way. \u201cI was either on Empire<\/em> or doing a movie,\u201d she explains. \u201cSo this time, it was perfect. That\u2019s why I think the play found me. In some way, spiritually, I feel like I was supposed to do it.\u201d<\/p>\n In fact, Henson has adjusted rather quickly to the rhythms and the rigors of performing live. \u201cIf you\u2019re emoting on the stage or you tell a joke, you know right away if the audience feels it. In film, you have to wait until they yell cut, so it\u2019s a delayed reaction. And you also have no control. You can put fire in the can, baby, but then they can go into the editing room and chop and screw your performance. But when I\u2019m on that stage? Ain\u2019t no editor.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n![\"Image](\"https:\/\/assets.vogue.com\/photos\/69eb135276532a7fe0b0463f\/master\/w_1600%2Cc_limit\/260328_JTCAG_DressR-479-F.jpeg\"\/)
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