Broadway Casting Director Benton Whitley Announces New Whitley Theater Agency

EXCLUSIVE: Broadway Casting Director Benton Whitley today announced the formation of Whitley Theatrical, a New York City-based theater, film and television casting and production agency.

Whitley founded the Broadway casting agency Stewart/Whitley with former business partner Duncan Stewart. As Deadline reported yesterday, Stewart is joining RWS Entertainment Group to lead the new ARC casting division; The Stewart/Whitley agency was disbanded.

Associate managing director Micah Johnson-Levy joins Whitley at his new company, with acquisitions and legal counsel from Jordan Manekin and management from Karen Morales at Armanino LLP.

In a statement, Whitley said: “In recent years there has been so much disruption and necessary change, both in the world and in particular and in the theater industry in particular. Time to move from just casting to casting and manufacturing. The stories we tell and the storytellers who tell them, both on and off the stage, matter more than ever. We look forward to continuing to nurture the stories, talent and artists needed to make this happen.”

Whitley is currently represented by the Broadway and North American tour of the 2019 Tony and Grammy Award-winning Best Musical city ​​of Hadesfor which Whitley won the 2020 Artios Award for Excellence in Casting.

In addition to what it calls “creative and inclusive casting,” Whitley Theatrical will also produce and develop new work for the stage. Producing projects and collaborations will be developed and announced in the coming seasons. The new company says it will cultivate queer representation on stage for years to come.

Whitley Theatrical is currently working on projects in development including goddess (Director: Saheem Ali, Screenplay: Jocelyn Bioh & Michael Thurber), How to dance in Ohio (Sammi Cannold directs, Rebekah Greer Melocik & Jacob Yandura writes), Game (Director Diane Paulus, Writers V and Justin Tranter), Cowboy Bob (director Annie Tippe, writers Molly Beach Murphy and Jeanna Phillips) and reimagined revivals of Inherit the wind directed by Neil Pepe and Same time next yearDirected by Rachel Chavkin.

Additionally, Whitley Theatrical has completed the principal cast for Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice’s new production Evita (directed by Sammi Cannold) plays this summer at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge and the Shakespeare Theater Company in Washington DC, with a cast to be announced soon.

Stewart/Whitley has been a leading Broadway casting agency for over 12 years, including credits Chicago The Musical, La Cage Aux Folles, Pippin, On The Town, Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, The Lightning Thief, Paradise Square, and this season life of pi Drag superstar Jinkx Monsoon’s recent cast Chicago brought the long-running musical to the highest non-holiday grossing week in its 27-year career.