Ninety-five years after her inception, Betty Boop has made her way to the Broadway stage in a musical with a breakout star at its center.

“Boop! The Musical,” now playing at New York’s Broadhurst Theatre, follows Betty Boop (played by Jasmine Amy Rogers, making her Broadway debut) as she magically tumbles out of her whimsical, black-and-white cartoon world and into present-day New York while on a quest to find her true self.

Naturally, playful hijinks ensure as Betty adjusts to her new home. She also catches the eye of a dashing musician, Dwayne (Ainsley Melham), but the secret of her true identity threatens to thwart their budding romance.

Historians have long disputed Betty Boop’s origins. Though animator Max Fleischer drew her as a white woman, the character is believed to have been inspired by Black female entertainers of the 1920s, including Chicago-born singer Esther Jones, who went by the name Baby Esther.

For Rogers, reconnecting the character to her Jazz Age roots ― particularly as a Black actor ― in the musical has been a “life-changing” experience.

“Technically what Betty Boop is doing with her iconic phrasing ‘boop-oop-a-doop,’ it comes from scat, and that can be traced back to African American origins, and then African origins. So to get to bring her to life as a Black woman has been very, very exciting and rewarding and inspiring,” she explained.

She went on to note: “It’s also really exciting to play this iconic woman who is so fully of joy and love and everything good and nothing bad ... to get to do that, and have people see that, and have the story not necessarily be about the fact that I’m Black, or any suffering that has happened to the African American people ... just means everything to me.”

Melham, who hails from Australia, echoed those sentiments. “What’s great about this show is it delivers a new story for Betty that feels current,” he said. “It feels like an evolution ― you know, a Betty for 2025. For anyone who grew up with this character, this is a wonderful new chapter.”

Much of the critical acclaim “Boop!” has so far enjoyed has emphasized Rogers’ talents, and on Monday, she won an Outer Critics Circle Award for her performance. Next month, she’ll also compete with Audra McDonald in “Gypsy” and Nicole Scherzinger in “Sunset Boulevard” for a Tony Award. Together with Melham, best known to American theatergoers for his stint in Broadway’s “Aladdin,” she infuses the show with a throwback charm that evokes old Hollywood.

A Massachusetts native, Rogers learned of “Boop!” ahead of the musical’s pre-Broadway 2024 run in Chicago. Her first audition, however, was derailed when she found herself struggling with director-choreographer Jerry Mitchell’s intricate footwork. After honing her dance skills while in a touring production of “Mean Girls,” she returned for a second “Boop!” audition ― and won the part.

“A lot of times in my life, I’ve just kind of taken a back seat to things like that, and [I’ve] just been like, ’You know, if it’s meant to be, it’ll come to me.’ But I decided to go for it,” she said.

One of Rogers’ supporters throughout the casting process was late actor Gavin Creel. The two met when Rogers tried out for a part in “Walk on Through: Confessions of a Museum Novice,” Creel’s final musical.

“He encouraged me in a way that I really needed at the time, and it sent me into my final callbacks with a fire lit underneath me,” she said of Creel, who died last year at age 48 from a rare form of cancer. “That’s the kind of person you hope you can be for somebody else. He was amazing in that way.”

As Rogers gears up for the Tonys next month, she’s begun looking to her post-“Boop!” future, too. Last month, she cinched a deal for an original solo album, though she stressed she’s “still discovering exactly what that looks like.”

As for Melham, he’s eager to pursue projects that will further showcase his song-and-dance talents. And though “Boop!” is not overtly political, he’d like the musical to provide a “safe space” for anyone feeling distraught by the current sociopolitical climate.

“The joy and love in this show can feel like a form of resistance,” he said. “We can smile and feel joy and love for two and a half hours before we have to go back out into the world and perhaps fight a little bit.”