GENERAL-Y SPEAKING
Detroit-born actor is well-versed in ‘The Book of Mormon’
Dewight Braxton Jr. was a good enough wide receiver at Detroit’s Cass Technical High School to score a football scholarship at Ferris State University — where he also studied engineering.
But Braxton's ultimate end zone proved to be in theater — including the touring company of “The Book of Mormon” that begins a home town run for him on Tuesday, March 14 at Detroit's Fisher Theatre.
“I'm kind of like Troy in ‘High School Musical,'” he says with a chuckle, referring to the jockturned-actor, played by Zac Efron in the 2006 Disney Channel film.
It's been a winning pursuit for Braxton, 27, who earned a subsequent degree in theater from Wayne State University. He moved to New York and has appeared in the Apple TV series “Dickinson” and the Amazon Prime film “Set in Motion,” as well as in stage productions of “The Wiz” and “The Lion King Jr.” “The Book of Mormon,” in which he plays the sadistic General (whose full name we can't print here), marks Braxton's first major national tour.
“I never played the villain before,” he notes. “‘Cause of my height and my (deep) voice I guess it works, but I'm really more like a teddy bear. But it's something I can see myself doing more — the older I get, the more I mature, I can definitely play more villains. This has really opened my eyes to it.”
Braxton is a self-described “late bloomer” to theater. He played football from the time he was in second grade until his second year of college (he also played basketball), but he “fell in love with theater” when he was younger and “always wanted to do it. I always loved the arts. I grew up in church. My whole family sings. It was there; I just never had the time to do it.” When he decided to hang up his cleats Braxton decided it was time, transferring to Wayne State and pursuing the craft in earnest.
“I love acting in general,” he says. “I've done some TV and film, but live theater has a special place for me. You never know what's going to happen, even technical things that might go wrong here and there. The audience reacts; you can actually hear people laugh or gasp sometimes, and it the whole show. You've just got to roll with it. It makes you improve.”
That's certainly happening for Braxton in “The Book of Mormon,” a musical for which polarizing is a gross (in every sense of the word) understatement. Written by “South Park” creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone along with composer Robert Lopez, the nine-time Tony Award-winning production (including Best Musical) opened on Broadway in 2011 and pulls no punches in its satire of religion — in this case the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints specifically. Its heroes are two young missionaries assigned to an outpost in Uganda where Braxton's general rules as an Idi Amin-styled warlord over an im
poverished population.
The jokes are crass, ribald and unsparing, and the scenarios horrific at times. “It’s not for everybody,” Braxton acknowledges. “We always have a couple of people who it’s not really their type of humor. That’s understandable — but it’s kind of on them for not doing the research.” But he maintains that if even those who are put off at first hang with it, they’ll find a redeeming heart in the show.
“By then end of the second act you can see it’s not being crude for nothing,” Braxton explains. “It wraps up in a nice little bow.” He also cuts the General, as a character, a little slack — especially since audiences tend to laugh at his costume and the first time he introduces himself with the name that, again, we can’t print here…
“The way I like to play it is that, yes, he’s the antagonist in the overall story, but in his world he thinks he’s the hero for what he’s doing,” explains Braxton, who based his accent on Forest Whitaker’s Academy Award-winning portrayal of Idi Amin in the 2006 film “The Last King of Scotland.” “He thinks he’s doing it to save Uganda, save his village. But he winds up with a happy ending, too.
“It’s really just fun walking on stage, feeling the power. Every time he comes on stage all eyes are on him, and he means business.”
Outside of “Mormon” Braxton is writing a musical of his own, and he’s also eyeballing other roles for the future — “Hamilton” and Donkey in “Shrek The Musical” being on top of his wish list. Football is well in the rearview mirror now, and his game plan in theater is to keep finding good roles and building and diversifying his skill set.
“I always love to gather all the information I can — the more information I get, the more I can use in different places,” he says. “All of it is different. With theater you have to make your intentions big enough to be read across, like, 40 feet, and on screen you have to pull it back and be more subtle. It’s always interesting.”