Lest We Forget: The Importance of
Black History in America

with Stacey Rose

Discussion on how reductive or revisionist views of Black History affect all Americans.

Sunday, June 16

1 pm at the St. Germain Stage

Special Post-Show Conversations Schedule

Café Chat

Friday, June 28 after the 7:30pm performance

CAST

	ANSA AKYEA* (Donavan) BSC Debut. Regional Credits include: Guthrie Theater: Cyrano De Bergerac (Rageneau), Clybourne Park (Albert/Kevin), To Kill a Mockingbird (Tom Robinson), A Christmas Carol (Christmas Present), Harvey (EJ Lofgren); Ten Thousand Things: Othello (Othello), Pericles (Pericles); Children’s Theater Company: Shrek (Donkey); Old Globe/CTC: The Lorax (Daddy Onceler); Park Square: Cardboard Piano (Soldier/Paul); Mixed Blood: Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Chad Deity), How to Use a Knife (Steve), Take Me Out (David Battle). Film/TV Credits: House of Tomorrow, Into Temptation, Memorial Day, Kid West, In an Instant (ABC). Merci Dieu, Seena, mes enfants, famille Akyea. @ansaakyea
	JORDAN BARROW* (Grant) BSC debut. Jordan was last seen as Ronny in the west coast premiere of Witness Uganda. Prior to that, he created the role of Themba in the world premiere Maltby & Shire musical, Sousatzka, in Toronto. TV: Pose (FX) and Broad City (Comedy Central). Off Broadway: The Tempest (Public Theater’s Shakespeare in the Park) and Held Momentarily (NY Fringe Encore Series). Regional: Peter Pan and The Miracle Worker (Paper Mill Playhouse), Finian’s Rainbow (Music Theatre of Wichita), and Hairspray (Charleston Stage). Training: BFA in Musical Theatre from the University of Michigan, The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. Thanks to family, friends, and the Abrams team. @JordanT_B
	KALYNE COLEMAN* (Leigh) BSC debut. Kalyne is from Richmond, Virginia and is a proud member of the Brown/Trinity MFA in Acting program’s Class of 2020 and University of Pennsylvania alum. Credits include — Trinity Rep: Nella Pea, Black Odyssey. Rites and Reason: Young Fannie Lou/Myrlie Evers, A Seat at the Table. Shakespeare Academy at Stratford: Lady Anne, Richard III & Rosaline, Love’s Labour’s Lost. 4A, UPenn: Beneatha, Raisin in the Sun & Latisha, The Story. Brown Trinity: Brutus, Julius Caesar; Selector, How We Got On; Henrietta, Last Days of Judas Iscariot; and upcoming, Gabriela in References to Salvador Dali: Make Me Hot. She sends gratitude and joy to her family and friends for their love and support. @kalynecoleman
	PETERSON TOWNSEND* (Jeffery) BSC debut. Past credits include: Antigone (Haemon) at Baltimore Center Stage; Ms. Bennett: Christmas at Pemberley (Charles Bingley) at St. Louis Rep; Satchel Paige & the KC Swing (Art Young) at Cincinnati Playhouse/St. Louis Rep; A Raisin in the Sun (George Murchison), Cinderella (Prince Sebastian), History Boys (Crowther), Our Town (George Gibbs) at the Arden Theatre; Twelfth Night (Sebastian) at Chicago Shakespeare Theater; Romeo et Juliet, Samson et Dalila, Adriana Lecouvreur at the Met Opera. TV/Film credits: Twelve, Law & Order SVU/CI/Prime, The Code, The Good Fight, Elementary, Madame Secretary, FBI, Gossip Girl.
	PEGGY PHARR WILSON* (The Voice) BSC: Gaslight, His Girl Friday, Guys and Dolls, The Crucible, To Kill A Mockingbird, Carousel, Laramie Project: 10 Years Later, 10×10 Festival (all 8 years!); BAT: Doubt; Shakes & Co: Leap Year; New York: Six Women with Brain Death (co-author, and performed it also in Chicago, Dallas & Kansas City). Regional: 10 seasons with Creede Repertory Theatre in Colorado performing over 50 roles, including Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd (Best Actress, Ovation Award Denver Post), Shirley Valentine, Moon for the Misbegotten and 3 Viewings. Many regional including: Dallas Theatre Center, Theatre 3, Kansas City Rep, Unicorn, KC Lyric Opera, White River in Vermont and Rose Theatre in Chicago.

A

CREATIVES

STACEY ROSE (Playwright) is a proud Black woman, daughter, sibling and mom. Her work celebrates and explores Blackness, Black identity, Black history, body politics and the dilemma of life as “other.” Stacey’s work has been presented at: The Fire This Time Festival, The Lark, The Amoralists Theatre Company, Rattlestick Playwrights Theater, National Black Theatre and Pillsbury House Theatre. Stacey has held fellowships/residencies with The Dramatists Guild, The Playwrights’ Center, Sundance Theatre Lab and The Goodman Theatre. Stacey’s play Legacy Land, developed at The Playwrights’ Center, will have a world premiere at KC Rep in February 2020.

OTIS CORTEZ RAMSEY-ZÖE (Dramaturg) recently served as Dramaturg for Klytemnestra: An Epic Slam Poem (Theater Alliance), Song For the Genius Child — Young Basquiat (John F. Kennedy Center), Legacy Land (The Playwrights’ Center), In the Southern Breeze (Alabama Shakespeare Festival), America v. 2.1 and All the Natalie Portmans (Sundance Institute Theatre Lab) and Hooded or Being Black for Dummies (Mosaic Theater Company). He is a Series Editor for NoPassport Press’ Dreaming the Americas Series and was a Lecturer of Theatre Arts at Howard University, Associate Artistic Director at banished? productions, and Future Classics Program Coordinator at The Classical Theatre of Harlem.

KEVIN BOSEMAN (Choreographer) is a former principal dancer with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and member of the Martha Graham Dance Company. Theatrical credits include Broadway: Equus; Broadway National Tours: The Lion King, The Color Purple and Shrek the Musical; Off Broadway: Accidentally, Like a Martyr; Regional: Ragtime (Kennedy Center) and A Chorus Line (Paper Mill Playhouse); Concerts: Once On This Island and The Music Man. He most recently choreographed a concert presentation of Tony Award winner Jason Michael Webb and Lelund Durond Thompson’s new musical WiLDFLOWER, a co-production between National Black Theatre and The Apollo, directed by Logan Vaughn.

LOGAN VAUGHN† (Director) is a New York-based Artist and Director. Logan was Playwrights Horizon’s Director in Residence 2012–2013. In 2012 Logan was also named a Member of the Director’s Lab, Lincoln Center. As a Director, she has worked with The Public Theater, MCC Theater, Kansas City Rep Theatre, Geva Theatre, Playwright’s Center, Playwrights Realm, Mosaic Theatre, 59E59, National Black Theatre and NYU Tisch School of the Arts. Her work in film includes assisting the Academy Award-winning producing team behind Precious and Monster’s Ball as well as serving as head of casting for several award-winning independents. Logan most recently directed the New York premiere of Loy Webb’s The Light at MCC Theater, for which she received an Outer Critics Circle nomination for Best Direction of a Play. This production is dedicated to all the black and brown bodies throughout American history that have been misplaced, silenced or forgotten. “This was a war for the possession of his body and that would be the war of his whole life.” Ta-Nehisi Coates

LUQMAN BROWN (Sound Designer) designed What Are You (Globe Theater), The Corpse Washer, How to Defend Yourself and We’ve Come to Believe and created original music for Everybody Black, all for the 2019 Humana Festival. His regional theatre credits include: Detroit ’67 (The Juilliard School), Skeleton Crew (TheatreSquared), The Three Musketeers (Classical Theatre of Harlem), The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (Asolo Repertory Theatre), Sense & Sensibility (Cape Fear Regional Theatre), The Parchman Hour (Guthrie Theater) and Adoration of the Old Woman (INTAR Theatre). His Off Broadway credits include Revolving Cycles Truly and Steadily Roll’d (The Duke on 42nd Street) and Hurt Village (Signature Theatre Company). Mr. Brown won both the 2017 and 2018 AUDELCO Awards for Sound Design. As a professional musician, he has performed in numerous bands and produced many others. luqmanbrown.nyc.

NTOKOZO FUZUNINA KUNENE (Costume Designer) is a South African costume and production designer based in New York. Recent credits include — The Public: The Winter’s Tale (Lee Sunday Evans, director), On the Grounds of Belonging (David Mendizábal, director), Wild Goose Dreams (Leigh Silverman, director). Off Broadway: Dutch Masters (André Holland), The Homecoming Queen (Awoye Timpo, director). Regional: Familiar (Danya Taymor, director), Master Harold and the Boys (Ryan Rillet, director). Film: Brave music video (Spike Lee, director), Forever Tree (Alrick Brown, director). She holds an MFA in Design for Stage and Film from NYU Tisch School of the Arts. fuzunina.com

JACK MAGAW (Scenic Designer) Recent Chicago and regional design credits include Indecent (Arena Stage), The Scarlet Ibis (Chicago Opera Theater), Approval Junkie (Alliance Theatre), Support Group for Men (Goodman Theatre), The Agitators and Other Than Honorable (Geva Theatre), Of Mice and Men (Kansas City Rep), The Realistic Joneses (Theatre Wit and Shattered Globe Theatre), Buried Child (Writers’ Theatre), The Bridges of Madison County and Miss Holmes (Peninsula Players Theatre), Radio Golf (Court Theatre), Man of La Mancha (Milwaukee Repertory Theater). Eleven Joseph Jefferson Award nominations include designs for East Texas Hot Links (Writers’ Theatre) and Long Day’s Journey Into Night (Court Theatre). Upcoming projects include Silent Sky (Peninsula Players Theatre) and the world premiere of Stacey Rose’s Legacy Land (Kansas City Rep). Jack lives in Chicago and teaches design at The Theatre School at DePaul University. jackmagaw.com

CHA SEE (Lighting Designer) is from Manila, Philippines. Credits include: Cute Activist (Bushwick Starr); Macbeth In Stride (Joe’s Pub); The Triumphant (Target Margin Theatre); Nora (The Juilliard School); What to Send Up When It Goes Down (The Movement); Mondo Tragic (National Black Theatre); Plural Love (Soho Rep Lab); Anna May Wong (Mabou Mines); The Maturation of an Inconvenient Negro (Cherry Lane); SKINNAMARINK (NYTW Next Door); Marisol (Trinity Rep). Upcoming: On the Grounds of Belonging (Long Wharf Theatre); In the Penal Colony (NYTW Next Door); What to Send Up When It Goes Down (Woolly Mammoth, A.R.T., The Public); EVERYBODY (PlayMakers Rep). Cha is exhibiting her works at the Prague Quadrennial 2019. Training: MFA NYU Tisch. For more: seelightingdesign.com

GEOFF BORONDA* (Production Stage Manager) BSC: The Chinese Lady, Typhoid Mary. New York: Ain’t No Mo’, Mobile Unit—Romeo & Juliet, Mobile Unit—The Comedy of Errors, Buzzer, Ping Pong, Under the Radar Festival, The Urban Retreat, The Great Immensity, Fortress of Solitude (The Public Theater); The Undertaking (The Civilians); generations (Soho Rep). Regional: Shakespeare in Love, Jazz (Baltimore Center Stage); A View from the Bridge (Center Theatre Group); Hamlet, A Doctor in Spite of Himself (Yale Repertory Theatre); Appropriate (Westport Country Playhouse). Education: MFA Stage Management from the Yale School of Drama.

Click to view.

America v. 2.1 is a day in the life of a troupe of historical re-enactors charged with telling the story of what was once was the American Negro, a woeful race once featured prominently in the American landscape, but whose time has been extinguished at their own foolish hand. The troupe finds themselves at odds with the state of their own existences while being painfully oblivious to the parallels and intersections their lives draw to that of the very Negroes whose story they are bound to tell. As this oblivion fades and they are faced with their stark reality, this day in the life of actors, becomes a day of reckoning.