The rich tradition and current state of Black Theatre is explored in this content, including discussions analyzing contemporary work and pieces honoring trailblazers. Consider starting with the Daughters of Lorraine podcast, the Journal series on the state of Black theatre, or the Journal series on Black women in the performing arts.
The Latest
Essay
Black Survival and Cyclical Fate in Hang Time
by Ciaran Short
4 June 2026
Video
Healing and Health: One Love Method Grounding Practices
A Racial-Justice Theatre Healing Session
Tuesday 9 June 2026
Boston, Massachusetts, United States
Podcast
LOUD Queer Youth Theatre: Sustaining Youth-Led, Adult-Supported Arts Community
by Nicolas Shannon Savard, Keyshia Pearl, Roney Jones
The One Love Method is a teaching and learning method for racial-justice theatre. Dr. Ayshia will walk participants through a healing session as an example of how the method can be used in the theatre classroom, rehearsal room and beyond.
Zora Howard’s Hang Time demands a deep contemplation of empathy. Ciaran Short discusses the way the play’s warping and flattening of time creates space to explore Black men’s capacity for gentleness, intimacy, and the mundane—even when forced into a suspended state.
Nicolas continues their conversation with Keyshia Pearl and Roney Jones, digging into LOUD Queer Youth Theatre’s youth-led, adult-supported program model and how the ensemble provides long-term community, and artistic and professional development for Black and indigenous trans and queer youth.
Gender Euphoria: The Podcast returns for season three. Host Nicolas Shannon Savard interviews Miss Keyshia Pearl and Roney Jones of LOUD Queer Youth Theatre about the ensemble’s programming, devising practices, and political education with Black and Indigenous trans and queer youth in New Orleans.
This episode takes a closer look at the interplay of particular participants and group dynamics in the workshops. They get to know each other by making theatre together and empathize with people from radically different circumstances. Jan and Finn begin a slow courtship. The drama club becomes a safe space for Mama Glo.
Every four years, Catholic seminaries across Nigeria come together for the All Saints Seminary Festival of Arts and Culture, which features theatre rooted in the cultures of Nigeria’s various ethnic groups. Israel Wepke sits down with Eseovwe Emakunu to discuss the process of making theatre with All Saints Seminary, Uhiele.
What leads people to prison theater workshops? This episode begins six intertwined, first-person tales of these workshops, framed by a love story between Finn, who was incarcerated, and Jan, who cofacilitated.
Series
WE WILL DREAM: New Works Festival 2025
The Water Remembers
Now in its second year, the festival embraces the theme The Water Remembers, exploring the transformative power of water as a vessel of remembrance, connection, and cultural legacy.
People, Planet, and Performance: From the Global South to the World
A Series from Africa on Climate Emergencies, Sustainability Practice in the Arts, and Planetary Crises
This is a broad-based interdisciplinary, intercultural, and cross-sectoral exploration of climate justice within the context of theatre and performance with a focus on the Global South.
In Critical Stages in Malawian Contemporary Theatre, Fumbani Innot Phiri Jr. interviews established theatre artists from all backgrounds to explore the precarious journey of theatre in a modern world, define its problems, and find better solutions to sustain performing arts in a generation of motion pictures. Fumbani leads discussions with established performers, directors, and writers who are exploring ways to greet these challenges while their works inspires their communities.
Decolonizing Dramaturgy: Theatremakers from Africa in Conversation
A 5-episode series featuring award-winning playwrights, dramaturges and directors from Africa
Each episode invites a playwright, dramaturge and director to speak on a specific topic related to their creative and dramaturgical processes. For accessibility, French Language translation is available for some series and American Sign Language interpretation for all series.
Series
Through A Black Woman’s Lens
A six-part virtual panel series examining the world of Broadway, Hollywood, Business, Literature, Spirituality, Sexuality, Academia and Misogynoir through a Black Woman’s perspective
A 6-part series with some America’s leading Black women from the world of literature, film, academia, theater, tech and business
Series
#DeafWoke
A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow
Founded as a response to isolation and misinformation experienced during CoVID-19, #DeafWoke provides access to the Deaf BIPOC life stories, critical coverage of the #BlackLivesMatter movement, education, Arts, social justice and analysis of CoVID-19-related news for Deaf, DeafBlind, DeafDisabled, Hard of Hearing, Late-Deafened and Black Hearing communities.
Creative Practice of African Women from the Continent
The 6-episode season features leading writers, poets, directors, producers and interdisciplinary theatre-makers who will share their artistic practices and methodologies.
Series
NBT @ HOME Presents An "Unbought & Unbossed" Conversation
A digital conversation series about the dynamic legacy of Shirley Chisholm and reclaiming our vote.
In tandem with its curated micro-commission series, "Unbought & Unbossed: Reclaiming Our Vote," National Black Theatre is hosting three NBT @ HOME conversations with its commissioned artists as well as community leaders and historians about the 100th Anniversary of the 19th Amendment, combating voter suppression, and our power to reclaim our vote.
About the Series: NBT @ HOME: Founder’s Month Edition is a four-part conversations series with artists and NBT Family around Dr. Barbara Ann Teer's legacy.
This podcast centers and privileges the narratives of Black theatremakers, scholars, and audiences while also underscoring the need for understanding the influence of Black theatre on the American theatre landscape.
Each of the dialogues in this series speaks of the connection between political activism, creativity, and spirituality— and highlights the importance of intergenerational knowledge-sharing for the future of the Live Arts and Theatre sectors of the UK.
Brett Bailey’s Exhibit B poses actors in tableau vivants that nod to 19th century human zoos, and Southwest African concentration camps. Patty Gone charts the controversy around the show and his own experience of it.
