Tony winner 'Purpose' succeeds on the backs of its matriarchs

Following six Tony nominations and two wins, the Pulitzer Prize-winning family drama “Purpose is losing its onstage matriarch.

Following six Tony nominations and two wins, the Pulitzer Prize-winning family drama “Purpose is losing its onstage matriarch.

LaTanya Richardson Jackson will perform with the original Broadway cast for the last time Sunday as the show heads toward the end of its run on Aug. 31. Brenda Pressley, who replaces her, has a long Broadway tenure that includes appearing in “Dreamgirls” and “Cats.”

“Purpose,” the play by “Appropriate” playwright and Tony winner Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, borrows from the lives of civil rights leaders like Jesse Jackson and other powerful Black figures to create a family drama set on one weekend in Chicago with the Jasper family.

Working alongside patriarch Solomon, who marched with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Claudine, played by Richardson Jackson, has kept the family legacy alive from behind the scenes. Naz, their youngest and more free-spirited son, narrates through the tension-filled belated birthday weekend for his mother.

Not fond of coming home to Chicago or sharing his famous lineage, Naz is nonetheless there to celebrate both his mother and his brother Junior, a state senator recently released from prison for embezzlement.