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♪♪ [ Indistinct talking ] ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ >> Welcome for session two.

This is day two of the International Black Writers Festival, and I would like to welcome you to our "Producing Art for Our Audience -- Our Audiences" panel.

With us to explore this illuminating topic is our esteemed moderator, Dr. Salamishah Tillet.

Dr. Tillet is a Pulitzer Prize-winning critic, scholar, and activist.

She received the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for criticism for her work as a contributing critic at large for The New York Times.

Dr. Tillet is the author of "In Search of the Color Purple" and "Sites of Slavery," which is for sale through Sankofa Books, which you can purchase a copy to have signed, um, after the panel is over, she co-hosted the award-winning podcast "Because of Anita" and received the 2020 Whiting Foundation Creative Nonfiction Fellowship for her upcoming book, "All the Rage: Nina Simone and the World She Made."

As the Henry Rutgers Professor of Africana Studies and Creative Writing at Rutgers University, Tillet also co-founded A Long Walk Home, an arts organization to end violence against girls and women.

She holds degrees from the University of Pennsylvania, Brown, and Harvard.

Without further ado, please welcome our moderator, Dr. Tillet, who will introduce our extraordinary panelists.

[ Applause ] >> So good afternoon.

Honored to be back here.

I think I was part of the inaugural -- or the revival of this conference a couple of years ago, so it's nice to come back in another form with another group of prestigious artists and cultural workers.

So I'm just going to introduce the three of them and then have a lively conversation.

Um, and I will do so in alphabetical order, I guess.

So Kamilah Forbes is an award-winning director and producer for theater and television.

She currently serves as the executive producer at the Apollo Theater in Harlem.

She's won awards for directing and producing, including the 2019 NBTF Larry Leon Hamlyn Producer Award, and an NAACP Image Award, so her directing credits include "By the Way, Meet Vera Stark," written by Lynn Nottage, "Blood Quilt" written by Katori Hall, and "Sunset Baby," written by Dominique Morisseau.

Uh, she's worked closely with Kenny Leon on "The Wiz Live!," "A Raisin in the Sun," uh, "Mountaintop" and "Stick Fly" on Broadway.

She's also the director of the forthcoming "Soul Train" musical, and she is the director of the television, uh, adaptation of Ta-Nehisi Coates' "Between the World and Me."

And she's also an alum here of Howard University, so thank you.

[ Cheers and applause ] Uh, Nina Angela Mercer is a multidisciplinary artist and cultural worker based here in Washington, D.C., and she's also a post-doc fellow here at Howard University.

So her plays have been performed at venues like the Woolly Mammoth, the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, and the Schomburg Center.

She's collaborated with Urban Bush Women and contributed to multiple anthologies, including "Black Girl Magic" and -- "Black Girl Magic" and "Are You Entertained?"

She founded Ocean Ana Rising, which is supported by the NEA and -- and Black Seed and just this past Monday, which is -- today's Tuesday, right?

Okay, so yesterday, I guess is the best way of saying it, uh, she published, um, a book called "The Double: A Choreodrama & A Choreopoem" with Kavaya Press.

So congratulations.

[ Cheers and applause ] Um, Psalmayene 24 is an award winning playwright, director and actor and is currently serving as the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at the Mosaic Theatre.

Known as Psalm by his colleagues and I assume, friends, he wrote and directed "The Blackest Battle," uh, Theater Alliance.

and the film "The Freewheelin' Insurgents" at the Arena Stage.

His directing credits include "Flow," "Necessary Sacrifices: A Radio Play," and "Pass Over."

Psalm won five Hel-- okay, that's a lot -- five Helen Hayes Awards for "Word Becomes Flesh"?

>> [ Speaks indistinctly ] >> Okay.

No, no.

Okay.

Well, he and others won five Helen Hayes Awards for "Word Becomes Flesh," and he currently hosts "Psalm's Salon at Studio" produced by the Studio Theatre.

So thank you all.

So the title of this panel is "Producing Arts," right?

Or something like "Producing Arts."

And so I was thinking of the idea of producing in a couple of ways.

Right?

So etymologically, it means, uh -- meaning -- it means forward and leading.

But there are other ways that we can think about producing.

Right?

We can think about it as something that's brought forth to the public.

We can think about it as the prolonging of the life of something, and we can think about it as just practically speaking, as like produce, like it's the result or an object that is birthed into the world and that kind of sustains us.

And so I want us to think about all of these different definitions of producing or produce as we're in this conversation together.

The artists up here have -- they represent a kind of wide range of theater production.

Right?

So we have directors, playwrights, um, actors all being in conversation with each other.

So -- And I assume at some point in your careers you've also been part of the crew.

So with the three of you, you could actually stage a production right here.

Um, and we have everything we need that stays within the tradition and pushes us forward.

So another thing I want us to think about is the relationship you have as individuals to your own creative process and the institutions that you may move in and out of, the tensions that exist, and the possibilities, um, that you help create for us.

Um, but oftentimes I like having a conversation about the beginning.

And so curious for each of you, well, when was the moment that you knew that theatre -- and I know there's different art forms that you may embody, play with, enter.

But theatre is the thing that brings us all together here.

When was it that you knew that theatre was your calling?

Um.

And it may go -- maybe yesterday, or it could have go way, way back.

But do you want to start?

>> Sure.

>> Okay.

>> Um, so when -- when did I know theatre was -- uh, um, you know, I think, um -- I grew up in Chicago.

Um, yes.

Shout out to Chicago.

[ Cheers and applause ] Um, and -- and that's significant, um, for a couple of reasons.

My parents emigrated from Jamaica to Chicago.

Yes.

Jamaica.

Yes.

No.

Yes.

Um, and so, um, there was a moment where there's -- Chicago is not known for having a very big Caribbean population or community.

Um, but there was a moment where my parents used to take us a lot to theatre because I think that's how they, um, related to understanding American culture, a culture themselves.

And I remember them taking me to a musical called "Once This Island."

Ooh, do I have some musical theater fans in the house?

Yes.

So the opening of the musical, when you see Little Ti Moune and I heard music that was familiar to me in my household of, like, the calypso steel pan and like the waves of just, you know, reggae and calypso, you know, music, et cetera.

and Caribbean music and the lilt of the language of Little Ti Moune on the stage, I saw a little Brown girl like me being reflected amongst the magic of the lights and the stage and -- and what all of those elements coming together when done right, can do.

And it was under that moment where I was like, "Oh yeah, I want to make that magic.

I want to do that."

I want to make other people feel seen and feel heard and feel elevated and transported in a way that I felt in that theater.

So that was the first time.

>> So similarly I think back to my childhood, I was born and raised here in Washington, D.C., and I actually went to the children's theater -- Kelsey Collie's children's theater camp here on Howard University's campus, and Ira Aldridge when I was in elementary school, and I also was in dance class from the time that I was about four years old, um, at the Creative Dance Center, which we took classes in the basement of People's Congregational Church, which is here in D.C. on 13th Street.

You know, so I was raised in a Black city, um, and -- and learned about culture in Black spaces.

Um, in dance class, my dance teacher loved musical theater.

[ Speaks indistinctly ] And she would put on, like, "Cinderella" and "Alice in Wonderland," but shift the plot so that it was very Black.

And very quickly I started to be cast in these shows, and so it was always there as a seed for me from the time that I was really small.

However, it was not until I was an adult and I felt myself wanting to speak back against some societal ills that I was confronting in the intimacy of my home, that I realized that it was theater where I had to have a conversation with my community.

But it was embedded there already, you know?

But when I felt myself in a community crisis that was very personal, I went back to that seed and I created from that space, knowing that there's nothing like the theater for the encounter, for the live experience, for the opportunity for us to to be in this reciprocal give and take.

>> Yeah.

And I'll say, um, for me informally, it started with my family and family parties as a -- as a child and dancing and having the adults hype me up, you know.

Um, I -- I grew up in Brooklyn.

[ Cheers and applause ] Uh, yeah.

Yeah.

Um, family's also Jamaican.

So, uh, come from that immigrant, you know, background.

Uh, but then in -- in school, of course, you get introduced to theater in school.

And I enjoyed performing, but it was really, uh, through hip-hop culture.

Uh, that's really where I really, uh, fell in love with performance and sort of the different elements that can go into, uh, a culture and an art form, and then eventually started mixing that with, uh, with hip-hop and was part of the first wave of hip-hop theater artists, along with Kamilah and a bunch of other -- shout out to Chad, who was also part of that wave.

Uh, so I'd say hip-hop was really the thing that sort of solidified my love for performance and bringing all elements of theater together.

>> Oh thank you.

It's a wide range.

Um, thank you for that.

So, uh, I'm going to ask a question to each of you.

But, Nina, if you could kick us off with this one.

I just wanted to talk a little bit about process.

We have a lot of students here who are becoming who they're going to be as artists, and they have these seeds from their childhood and their adolescence already in them.

But each of us has our own process for producing or creating works.

Mine is very intense as a writer.

Uh, more, I think akin to maybe an actor.

When I write about a play or I write about a performer, I really feel like I do a very deep archival process, and I try to get as close, almost to their interiority as possible.

It's very exhausting.

So I do feel like a bit of a method writer or method actor.

So that's my process and I recently understood what that is.

If you could tell us a little bit about -- and again, like each of you answer this question, what's like the process you have as you're writing or what's something that you kind of know as maybe not just unique to you, but is the thing you do every time, um, you're engaging in the process of creating a new creative work?

And even if you don't want to have to do it, you -- you still figure out you got to be pulled back into that ritual or that process that's intrinsic to you.

>> Okay, I'm going to answer this as a writer, but my inclination is to answer it as a writer and a producer.

>> Yeah.

>> Um, so maybe I'll get a little bit into that.

>> Yeah, that's fine.

>> Um, as a writer, you know, and I have to see things and I have to touch things.

So typically I just come to the page when I feel compelled.

Yes.

And I'm going to, like, spill onto the page.

I don't -- first of all, I'm, um, I'm a multidisciplinary writer, so sometimes I'm writing for theatre and sometimes I'm not.

But quite often it's theater and I will just spill onto the page, allow myself the freedom not to know.

And then once I discover what the kernel is that I want to explore further, I then like to map on the wall.

So typically I'll be using pieces of paper, uh, markers just to kind of outline the world of the play.

I may even sketch the world of the play so that it's not all narrative and language.

Often it's maps, um, concept books, collages so that I can understand characters.

What is their texture?

What -- What colors do I see, you know, when I think of these characters, you know?

And so I'll find magazines and make collages just to get the deepest understanding possible to fully immerse myself, right?

And then usually at the same time that I'm writing, I'm painting too.

So there'll be a collage book, but over years, for example, because it will take years to create a play, you know, "Gypsy & the Bully Door," one of my really important works, I first started in 2011, but because I was producing the work myself, it took this long for me to actually score it and have like a composition, right, along with my lyrics, because it's like a more protracted process when you're not working with a large budget.

So because there's that much time, typically I will have multiple iterations of me responding to an inquiry that was seeded as a play, but becomes acrylics and maps and collages and all of those things.

>> Wow.

Thank you.

Psalm?

>> Yeah, um, I think it starts, uh, with falling in love with some aspect of -- of the material.

It can be the actual, um, the person at the center of it, you know, like, um, I recently directed a production, uh, that was about Anna Julia Cooper, who I hadn't heard of prior to, you know, directing his production and absolutely fell in love with this woman.

Um, and then that drove my creative process.

Um, you know, if, uh -- if I start to research a piece and I don't necessarily have that excitement, then my research might lead me to then falling in love with this person.

Like, I wrote a play about, um, James Baldwin and Richard Wright that's based off of an event where they had a meeting at a café in Paris.

I hadn't known about that, and then that led me to reading, like, a lot of James Baldwin, I came to Baldwin late, uh, and when I started reading his nonfiction, I was like, "What the entire --" like, this -- this man is like, he's as prophetic and as great as everybo-- like, that's real.

That's not like, you know, B.S.

Um, and then lately, um, since the pandemic, nature has played a pretty significant role in my artistic practice.

A lot of times I go to Rock Creek Park and just walk the trails there, and then really just commune and let whatever you want to call it, energy, God, spirit, forces, you know, um, come through me and then that sort of -- that helps.

Like without fail, nature pretty much does its magic and helps me to create in terms of, you know, motoring my creative process.

>> Hmm.

>> I love that, I love the the nature, the falling in love, the tactile.

Um, I, I guess I'd answer this almost similarly, right?

I feel like I have to -- if I'm -- if it's a play I'm looking to direct or produce I -- Yes.

Falling in love with the piece itself.

But also I think for me sometimes there's a -- I always ask, "Why this piece?

Why now?"

I'm always looking for the contemporary relevance.

And this is at a point, you know, whether it's a revival or whether it's a new play, I want to know what is the conversation that we're having, the contemporary conversation that we're having within the piece that's relevant to the rest of the world?

Um, because for me, theatre is about, like you said, that communion with the audience, I mean, that is just as critical and -- and wanting to make sure that that question is just as urgent that we're answering or having or that dialogue.

Um, for instance, when -- when um, similar -- you brought up "By the Way, Meet Vera Stark," which was about, um, a Black woman actress in the 1930s and looking at her career in the 1930s and the 1970s, finding her voice and being on the outsides of Black Hollywood, of just Hollywood in general.

Well, that sounds familiar, right?

Like, so there were pieces of that play which I could completely relate to with what was happening in the world when we did it in 2017.

Um, and similarly so, you know, when we were looking at the adaptation for Ta-Nehisi Coates' piece "Between the World and Me," this was in 2019.

And we, you know, the over policing of our communities, um, police sanctioned deaths and violence.

Um, wanted to use theater for me as a vehicle to have those urgent conversations in a -- in a way that film just can't, in a way that in film and reading a book, you're -- you're solitary, you're alone.

In theater, you're forced to sit next to someone.

You're forced to walk outside the theater with hundreds of people and forced to be in some kind of, whether it's a metaphysical or psychological dialogue with them or your family.

And that's what I'm really passionate -- I guess what leads me to work on pieces and the why.

>> Hmm.

I remember, um, when Broadway returned during -- or after the pandemic, and I just fell in love with theater again because it was such a -- to be -- I mean, you're slightly risking your life a little, but to be in community -- well, it was still like, you know, not vaccines and stuff, but to be in community with people and the aliveness.

Right?

It was -- it was like the one art form, um, that made me grateful to be alive in a different way than film or television or reading did.

So I -- this cathartic and also this kind of imperative that theater gives us, I think is really profound and also probably healed us as a -- as a people as we were coming out of, you know, being in our homes during the pandemic.

So I do have this question.

I'm going to start with you, Psalm about audience, um, and public, uh, and it's something that I imagine we are always thinking about.

I don't know at what stage in your process you're thinking about it.

So that's one question.

When does the audience emerge as an interlocutor for you in your creative process, as a writer or as a director?

And then who is your ideal audience and then how do you reach them?

>> Yeah, great -- Great question.

Um, so the -- the first audience that I think about are really my -- my peers when it comes to, uh, Black people, honestly.

I mean, all ultimately my work is for everyone.

And, um, I grew up in Park Slope in Brooklyn, which is a very, um, diverse, uh, neighborhood.

So oftentimes when I think of an audience, I think of the neighborhood that I grew up in, which is multicultural -- that's the term we used back then -- and different ages, different, you know, genders, sexual orientations, very eclectic, uh, but primarily, you know, it's like my people have to get what I'm saying.

They have to understand it.

And then everybody else also.

Yes.

Come on board.

Um, but, you know, there's -- there's an urgency that I feel in terms of making sure that I'm not creating art that is, you know, just for white folk.

I mean, I see theater like that by, you know, um, artists of color sometimes.

And it feels to me as if they're really speaking to white people, you know, in like, regional theater, that they're not really talking to us, that they're trying to explain something.

So I do my best to avoid that and to just say, hey, sure, it's for everybody.

But like, if my people don't understand it and get it and it doesn't excite them, and if it doesn't challenge them too, then I feel like somehow I've, I've missed the mark.

Um, and I feel, you know, uh, empty inside and I'm -- and I'm trying to avoid that and -- you know, and just trying to make sure that I give some kind of, you know, food and sustenance for us.

>> Um, uh, Kamilah, same question for you.

So -- and I want you to think about it both as a kind of -- as a director and then as the executive producer of the Apollo.

Right?

So who is your public?

Oh, no.

First, when does the public emerge in your creative process as an entity or people that you need to engage?

Um, who is your ideal public and how do you reach them?

>> Cool.

Well, I'm gonna take it back to Howard, actually.

>> Take it back to Howard.

Okay.

>> So -- So when I was a student at Howard in fine arts -- Psalm, we were students together in fine arts, right?

Um, we would do plays outsi-- in the department, but we would do plays in the thea-- in the city.

And I remember I was doing plays at -- like, I was understudying at plays at Studio Theatre.

August Wilson plays.

I was Rose.

Like, this -- Rose was 35 years old.

I was 19.

What do I know about divorce and my husband having a child down the block?

Nothing.

I would invite my friends.

Dr. Talton, at the time.

He was a student, uh -- >> Known as Ben.

>> Known as Ben at the time.

Right?

Like I would invite my friends to come see me do these plays in the city at Studio Theatre, Shakespeare, and they weren't coming, right?

They were like, "Eh, that's not for me.

Eh, it's not speaking to me," whatever, right?

I also, at the time while at Howard was in several rap groups, as was Psalm.

Right?

Um, not to, you know, put you -- right?

Right?

Alright.

So we did music, but -- but I say that to say that we were part of a community of peers, and our community was hip-hop, and our community existed here on this campus.

But there were no plays that we could turn to where my peers were like, "Word, I'm coming to see that.

Oh, yeah," you know, because that's not -- it wasn't in the canon of lexicon.

We didn't have Nina Mercer at that time.

We didn't have Psalmayene 24.

But what was fascinating to me and bringing back to Howard and why I'm so blessed to be at this university at the time, was that we had professors, professors that pushed us to think outside of the boundary and to say, "Okay, if it's not there, then build it."

I never thought of myself as a playwright.

Um, we then got together and started a theater company called Hip-Hop Theatre Junction, myself, Psalmayene, Chadwick Boseman, several of our other classmates, and started writing plays in our own voice.

We would take spoken word.

We would take hip-hop lyrics, experimented putting two DJs on stage as a soundtrack.

That was my musical theater, right?

Um, uh, my dancers were hip -- uh, you know, break dancers, pop-lockers from -- from the area.

And that became the foundation of the work.

So -- So to say that to say is that the first thing I thought about, we were thinking about was our peers, was our audience, and then started building work for their voices.

Um, and that's how I think I first entered into producing.

And then, um, I started a festival called Hip-Hop Theater Festival that Nina also was a part of.

And, um -- And so when I think about that, also for the Apollo, it's similar.

It is audience.

What do people want and hear and need?

And how can we create a story in an engaging way that speaks to the, um, um, the wide diversity of the folks that live right around us?

Right?

The wide diversity of folks who are right here to feed, to susten-- you know, sustenance because art and culture is sustenance.

So it's important that we're -- we're building a diversity and a wide breadth of, you know, tools in our toolbox or, you know, pieces of meals on the plate for people to be fed.

>> Mm.

Um, Nina, so you have -- again, you also have multiple audiences on the page and on the stage.

And I was curious if you could talk about the same things, you know, when do they emerge, who's your ideal, and how do you and does it differ, I think, in terms of performing versus writing for you or is it the same?

>> [ Speaks indistinctly ] Yeah, it's -- so with writing audiences, depending on like if it's academic writing, you know, that's a completely different audience.

When I'm -- When I'm thinking about theater, I'm writing for my block.

I'm writing for my community.

I think the answer is very much the same as both of you.

Um, you know, I think what's curious to me is when, as playwrights and I've been in this position, to be really honest, earlier in my career where people were telling me, "Your plays are too Black."

[ People gasp ] I've had -- like, I've had people tell me, "Your plays are so Black that you're probably going to have a hard time, um, you know, like moving your work forward in theatre," or people telling me that, "Well, your plays are about healing and about the healing of the people who are in the work at the same time as we're thinking about healing as a community through the work."

And so -- And I've received those types of statements, both from, um, producers who are not Black, you know, and also from some of my peers.

But that has always caused me to double down on being true to my voice and on demanding of myself the utmost honesty and courage and, you know, the understanding that we can make a show, I can make a show.

We can raise the money to make a show.

Oftentimes I've had theater professionals tell me, "Well, the audiences for this particular regional house are predominantly white.

Why would they want to experience your show?

You need to put some white people in your show, some white characters, so that the audience can see themselves reflected in the work."

And again, I say, you double down.

You stay true to what you do because once you compromise yourself, there's no going back from that, you know?

So I can't -- I mean, my audience is always going to be my people first.

Like I said, I'm born and raised here in Washington, D.C., you know, at a time when it was the "Chocolate City," I never had a question as to whether or not there was a diverse audience of people from throughout the Diaspora, you know, of all different backgrounds would be interested in Black storytelling ever.

But it wasn't until I became a "professional playwright" and entered the field, um, that it is really predominantly white, that I had to really have some tough conversations in my heart.

You know, do you want to make a work for a community of people who, yes, they are the people who are out there in the audience.

Do you want to, like, intentionally try to pull to them, or are you going to continue to hold to your truth, you know?

And I think all of us are confronted with those questions on a -- on a regular basis.

And, and we show up or we don't.

>> Hm.

Thank you.

Um, again, 'cause we have so many wonderful students here, I always think of, like, syllabuses or bibliographies, um, and I wanted to know if you could contribute to one today.

So meaning that, who do you look to in the past to help you answer these difficult questions about audience or creativity or process.

So what -- who are the people you look to before us, and who do you look to today to help you through this?

And so just thinking of either works or artists themselves.

And we're going to start with -- is that okay?

Okay.

[ Laughs ] >> Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Yeah.

I mean, when I think about works, I think about, um, uh -- I think about, you know, two brilliant Black women playwrights, Lorraine Hansberry, Adrienne Kennedy.

The brilliance about studying theatre here at Howard, where a lot of my peers who went to other theatre schools around.

Like, those women were my canon.

Right?

Like other canons, yes, Chekhov, Ibsen, et cetera.

They were my canon.

Adrienne Kennedy's work breaks the mold of just form itself, um, and -- and she's daring, um, and it's experiment-- she's all about experimentation.

And I think about her like, "Oh, yeah, that's possible."

Like, there's no boundary, there's no edges, um, when I think about her work.

And then Adrienne and language -- I mean, Lorraine and language.

>> And then today?

>> Today.

Mm.

Today.

>> And it could be outside of theatre just to -- so you don't have to just namedrop your -- >> Oh okay.

Name people we work with.

>> Yeah.

[ Laughter ] >> Yeah.

Dominique Morisseau.

Katori Hall.

I know they'll want me to say their names.

Um, I think, um -- do you know what I'm inspired by today is uh, young poets.

>> Mm.

>> Like, I was at a poetry slam the other day and literally these -- these poets were like in college, they were college age at NYU and New York, right?

And a lot of them came from NYU, Baruch, CUNY.

But, like, the inventiveness of language and form and -- and performance all in one, pshht, blew my mind.

So, yeah, find me at a poetry slam.

>> Okay.

[ Chuckles ] Who knew?

>> Nina?

So before us and then now.

>> [ Speaks indistinctly ] I would say Derek Walcott, "Dream on Monkey Mountain."

I've been obsessed with that play since I was 18 or 19 years old in Caribbean literature at Howard University.

Um, and I love that play for, um, the masquerade of it, the post-colonial critique of it, the psychological critique, um, of coloniality and how it shows up in our, um, society and our most intimate relationships and conceptions of self.

Um, the the masking, it's just -- it's brilliant.

And I wish I could I could see it on stage live right now.

Um, I love Aishah Rahman also, "Mojo and the Sayso."

So, you all, those two, Derek Walcott, "Dream of Monkey Mountain," Ayesha Rahman -- any of her work.

And also, I cannot, like, leave the stage without saying Ntozake Shange.

I had the opportunity to sit in her archive at Barnard in March.

And I pulled three bo-- No no, no.

How many boxes?

They had 30 boxes from her archive.

I spent days.

And I mention that because in addition to reading work, you know, there's something about sitting with an artist's life and their journals and sketches and the letters sent to them from producers, or, you know -- that just -- it was so fulfilling.

It brought me to tears.

I began, you know, with one box that included her childhood journals and ended with her cane.

>> Ooh.

>> And I just -- if -- when you have an opportunity to sit with an artist's archive, you simply must go.

It will change your life.

Um, in terms of today, this is so tough for me.

I love dance.

I will say that.

I'm going to kind of do what you did, take a cue from you.

Um, I love dancers, actually, and I love to move my body.

Um, but I love to watch dance and the story, um, in the body that we get to explore in a different way, you know, beyond the words.

I mean, dance is its own language.

So that inspires me >> Thank you.

>> Yeah.

Uh, definitely Ntozake's in my shrine as well.

Um, in a lot of ways, she's like a proto hip-hop theater artist because she was messing with form in a way that was really exciting, you know?

Um, Lorraine, of course.

Lorraine Hansberry, August Wilson.

Just, like, the classic, you know, um, Black playwrights whose shoulders we stand on.

Um, and I feel like we -- there's so much more that we can mine from them.

You know, especially someone like, um, August, a lot of these productions are done realistically, and I think just like Shakespeare, there's room to now play with form within the beautiful text that he's given us.

Um, Baldwin, of course.

Uh, and then contemporary -- Kendrick Lamar excites me, like in terms of what he does with lyricism and then his vulnerability and his rhythm and soul and, you know, all -- all -- all of that.

Um, and then, yeah, dance in general, like, that's such a big part of my identity and who I am and my -- and my practice in different ways.

So even to go to, like, you know, uh, Alvin Ailey Dance Theater, like, you know, that sort of dance as well, and then even, like, social dances, like I learn from, like, y'all, like, the new dancers.

I don't know what the new dances are, but like -- like just the different social dances that the -- that the youth are doing now inspire me because then that's going to turn into something and it comes from somewhere.

It is connected to us and those who came before us too.

>> Hm.

Thank you.

That was really uh -- I didn't -- I love when I can't predict what people are going to say.

So thank you so much for giving us such a breadth and also deep history.

So my last question before I open it up to the audience or to -- to you all, um, is about the future.

So we went back to the past.

We were in the moment we're in.

But in 2020, the world changed for a number of reasons.

But, uh, Black theatre makers really wrote a profound statement describing the ways in which the white gaze and white gatekeepers, um, infect or, uh, how do I say this, um, control what we see on the stage.

And so if we think about ten years from now, what is it you hope the story of Black theatre is that we're telling ourselves?

And then, Nina, I think we're starting with you because you're next in my -- my -- my order here.

So, yeah.

>> Okay, I -- in ten years... >> Ten years, yeah.

>> ...what do I want to see?

What do I hope for Black theater?

>> Yeah.

Yeah.

>> I hope that we're working more interdependently.

I hope that we continue in that vein.

I think that a lot of -- I know the Apollo and National Black Theatre just produced, um, a show together, "The Divining" by Ebony Noelle Golden, who's a friend of mine, a sister of mine.

Um, I say that because, you know, it's not sustainable for institutions to try to monopolize, right, the fields.

It's not sustainable.

It's not healthy.

We don't have as diverse a community of voices being represented when that happens.

And so what I hope is that we start to understand that institutions must collaborate, you know, and sometimes in surprising ways.

Maybe it's an art gallery and a theater, you know, where work happens in the art gallery and then in the theater later.

What are the ways that producers can come together as a cohort and agree to produce one another's work over a five year period of time?

How can we become more sustainable, less competitive, and more about creating more art to bring to the community?

And I think that's the way.

So to just -- and even shifting leadership models, you know, away from solitary, one leader I think that, you know, we benefit from having multiple people share leadership, you know?

>> Yeah.

Um, I'll start artistically first.

I would love -- in ten years, I would love to see a, um, a new genre of theatre that that you all create, that your generation creates.

Um, I think that is, uh -- I think it's possible.

I don't have any idea what it would be.

Uh, but I would love to see, you know, young -- young people, you know, of -- of color, Black, Black folk, Black youth really shake things up with form in, like, a really radical way.

Uh, and then I think it's the same old conversation about us and having our own institutions.

Like, I think like we -- like, until that happens, I think there's going to be a lot of complaining that we do, um, and until we do that, I -- I think we're going to, you know, be sort of trapped in this hamster wheel.

Um, yeah.

>> I can't agree more.

Um, you know, I think it's about more theaters that we claim unapologetically Black in this country.

During the Black Arts Movement, there were close to 300, almost 400 Black theaters across this country.

In 2012, there were ten reported.

Right?

>> [ Speaks indistinctly ] >> Exactly.

Exactly.

Right?

Ten.

So what that means is, where are the spaces that we're claiming ours for us to have our own commune and ritual of what everyone here is talking about, that is -- is -- it's not just for that one Black show, but it is literally a space for us to share our voice, to -- to claim our identity.

Um, and sure, everyone is welcome, sure, but this is an unapologetically claimed Black space.

There has to be more.

There has to be more to welcome in the multiplicity of genres, to welcome in the multiplicity of voices.

There can't just be the handful.

It puts an inextricable amount of pressure around the existing institutions.

Um, and -- and -- and -- yeah, for -- for our voice to continually -- we have a wealth of talent within just our community alone, but we've got to have the institutions to support that, so more Black spaces.

>> Thank you all for this conversation.

And thank you all for inviting us to be here.

>> This program was brought to you by WHUT and made possible by contributions from viewers like you.

For more information on this program or any other program, please visit our website at WHUT.org.

Thank you.