MEMPHIS, Tenn. — As Memphis celebrates Black Restaurant Week, the cast of the smash Broadway musical ‘Ain’t Too Proud’ headed to the historic Four Way restaurant for a helping of soul food.
The musical is playing at The Orpheum in downtown Memphis, and tells the story of 1960s Detroit's Motown records, home to chart toppers Smokey Robinson and the Miracles and the Supremes. One of the show's stars is even from Memphis, and he led the cast to the historic restaurant, which was a meeting place during the Civil Rights movement.
"I am originally from Memphis, Tennessee born and raised. I play Eddie Kendricks in ‘Ain't Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations’," said actor Jalen Harris. "I'm sitting here at the world, famous Four Way Grill with the other Temptations. Ha, ha, ha."
"As soon as I walked in here, I felt the love,” said actor Elijah Ahmad Lewis. "Ahhh, to be in Memphis, Tennessee for Black Restaurant Week and to be at a historical restaurant."
"This food, let me explain something to you. It looks good now, but I'm about to devour this thing and I know that love is put into it,” said Lewis.
Memphian Harris is excited for his hometown to check out the musical.
"To be in a show like this is like one of the highest honors of my life,” he said. "It's like Get Ready and My Girl and Just My Imagination and I Wish It Would Rain. It's singing standards that have meaning to the culture of who I am. So, it means a lot for me and the people who come before me and all of the shoulders that I stand on."
‘Ain’t Too Proud’ runs through March 12, 2023. Learn more at https://orpheum-memphis.com/all-events/performance/broadway-theatre/aint-too-proud/.