Nichelle Lewis Talks Ragtime, Grief and Growth in Her Breakout Broadway Role

Nichelle Lewis gets chills from scenes in Ragtime, too. Night after night at Lincoln Center’s Vivian Beaumont Theater, Lewis tells the story of a woman who “begins in the lowest place you could possibly be.” Her character Sarah’s emotional journey is about as intense as it gets, and Lewis has felt the highs and lows for seven months. Lewis and Broadway.com Editor-in-Chief Paul Wontorek unpacked her relationship to Sarah, her grandmother’s influence on her performance and crying together with the audience.

Some things are just meant to be. When Ragtime was announced as New York City Center’s Annual Gala Presentation, there was a different Sarah attached to the cast: Joy Woods. Woods would go on to leave the production to play Louise in the Gypsy revival starring original Sarah, Audra McDonald, with Joaquina Kalukango replacing her. Kalukango had to depart due to scheduling conflicts, and Lewis stepped into the pink floral dress. Ragtime is her second Broadway credit, and it is not unlike her first as Dorothy in The Wiz.

“It was kind of similar,” Lewis says of her characters' separate journeys, “in the way that [Dorothy] was trying to figure out, 'Where do I belong in this world?’ and ‘What does hope look like for me?’” Those questions are essential to her portrayal of Sarah as well. In fact, Lewis found herself so “in the pocket” that she would get chills after performing scenes. Lewis recalls, “My body was like, 'Here, you're going through trauma. This is real.' But it's not.”

So, how does Lewis go about getting into the mind of Sarah? Her body does it for her. “I basically have these thoughts that start up that give me the emotional capacity that I need for this character,” she says. “They just start swirling. And throughout the whole time, as I'm getting ready, before I even step on stage, I'm in it.” Castmates who pass by her in the halls might see Lewis staring at the ground or bending down and taking deep breaths. This all allows her to be as emotive as possible, she explains. “Sometimes the hardest part of playing such a deep character is allowing yourself to be as vulnerable as it gets.”

Sarah, as taxing as she is on the mind and body, serves as a way for Lewis to get out of the metaphorical box that playing ingénue Dorothy put her in. “People look at you and they see little Nichelle, versus Ragtime is such a different Nichelle.” What Sarah goes through in the show—not to mention the age gap between Lewis and Joshua Henry, who plays her love interest Coalhouse Walker, Jr.—is certainly enough to cement Lewis' adult status. “It puts such a different light on me and who I am and what I can do and who I can be on a stage,” she says. “It gave me the opportunity to show people that I can also do that as well.” And for that, Lewis calls the role “an honor and a privilege.”

Tragically, Lewis never got to share this role with her late grandmother, who passed away on Ragtime’s opening night. While she was not physically in the theater, she was with Lewis in spirit, appearing in her mind right before she walked on stage. A member of her team even thought ahead so much as to reserve a ticket for Lewis’ grandmother, which was never picked up. “Looking out and seeing her face was wild to me, and it was even more wild when my mom told me a few days after that she was gone,” Lewis says. She missed her grandmother’s funeral because she chose to perform on the day. “I went through the whole show and they had to pick me up off the ground,” she says. “It was rough, but there was literally no other place that I wanted to be.” Every night during the prologue, Lewis nods to those she has lost to thank them for their continued support.

Lineage and ancestry are major themes in Ragtime, something audiences cannot help but think about while watching. Would she even be on a Broadway stage if not for her ancestors and her willingness to dream? Unfortunately, Sarah and the other Black characters in Ragtime do not see their dreams realized. “In America, a lot of people do not get their dream,” Lewis says. “They don't get to have that American dream, and that is largely because we still have a lot of work to do, and that's okay to know. It's okay to remind yourself of the history and the past and what's going on right now, and to try and be better, and to try and hold on to hope. Sarah and Colehouse both held on to that hope that it would be better.”

The tragedy and beauty of that sentiment—that we may dream of things becoming better—moves people, including Lewis, to tears nightly. Throughout its run at New York City Center and now on Broadway, the context has changed with the world. What audiences were grappling with in 2024 is different from 2026, and yet very much the same. One thing that remains is the shared experience between audience and cast as the show continues to run, as do the tears. “I'm sure they're used to seeing me up there with a wet face,” Lewis says, “so we can cry together.”

Watch the full interview below.

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