On The Scene: Broadway musical ‘Kimberly Akimbo’ gives shoutouts to New Jersey

“Kimberly Akimbo” is set in Bergen County, and multiple New Jersey town names are mentioned throughout the show.

Mar 16, 2023, 3:09 PM

Updated 594 days ago

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A Broadway musical set in New Jersey will have theatergoers from the Garden State waiting to see if their town is mentioned in the show.
The comedy “Kimberly Akimbo” is set in Bergen County, and multiple local town names are mentioned throughout the show.
The story surrounds a girl named Kim (played by Broadway veteran Victoria Clark) with a rare aging condition that has left her the spirit of a 15-year-old in the body of a nearly 70-year-old woman. Her best friend is Seth, played by Justin Cooley in his Broadway debut.
"You can always tell when there are New Jersey people here because they die at the Jersey jokes. And you can feel that it's isolated, like an isolated uproar that sticks out from the rest of the audience,” said Cooley.
"It's the perfect setting, it's so grounding and it's quirky," he said. "And I think people that are from there [New Jersey] really relate and they see these kids and see our characters and are like ‘I know them.’"
“Kimberly Akimbo” opened last fall after a successful previous run off-Broadway.