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Black Theatre

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
5 May 2026
silhouette of two people embracing, with a red and purple starry background.
Video

A talk on Black sex, Black bodies, and Black love led by Dr. Ayshia Stephenson

Monday 15 March 2021
United States

Dr. Ayshia Mackie-Stephenson presented Confessions of a Black Intimacy Director with Dr. Ayshia livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Monday 15 March 2021 at 3 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 5 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 6 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

portraits of antoine hunter purple fire crow and of katrina rahman stephens with text event details.
Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 11 March 2021
United States

Antoine Hunter presented #DeafWoke with Katrina Rahman-Stephens livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 11 March at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5). Guest to be announced.

zoom video chat of several people
Essay
3 March 2021

Holly Derr and Calley N. Anderson sit down to talk about how Calley adopted historian Saidiya Hartman’s theory of critical fabulation when writing her new play The Story and the Teller about the effect of the Memphis yellow fever epidemic of 1878 on African Americans and immigrants.

a black rectangle with the text: Antoine hunter presents: #DeafWoke
Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 25 February 2021
United States

Antoine Hunter presented #DeafWoke with Michelle Banks livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 25 February at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

Video

Celebrating and learning from the centuries-long Black freedom dialectic between the Caribbean and Philadelphia

Tuesday 23 February to Saturday 27 February 2021
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Black Spatial Relics presented their second annual convening livestreaming on the global, commons-based peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv from Tuesday 23 February to Saturday 27 February 2021.

text one love on black background
Video

One Love pedagogy, a racial justice method for teaching and learning theatre

Monday 22 February 2021
United States

Dr. Ayshia Mackie-Stephenson presented One Love: A Racial Justice Theatre Workshop with Dr. Ayshia livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Monday 22 February 2021 at 3 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 5 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 6 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

a black rectangle with the text: Antoine hunter presents: #DeafWoke
Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 18 February 2021
United States

Antoine Hunter presented #DeafWoke with Ashlea Hayes livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 18 February at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5). Guest to be announced.

a colorful illustration
Essay

Mad Libs for a Culture Shift

17 February 2021

Nia Farrell shares her vision of the future—one that exists now, on this very Earth, and that begins with the declaration: “I am adamant that Blk people exist in the future.”

Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 11 February 2021
United States

Antoine Hunter presented #DeafWoke with Warren “Wawa” Snipe livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 11 February at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5). Guest to be announced.

episode five claudia alick calling up justice
Podcast

Building Our Own Tables Episode #5

27 January 2021

During this episode of Building Our Own Tables, podcast host Yura Sapi talks with Claudia Alick, founding executive producer of the transmedia social justice company Calling Up Justice.

Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 21 January 2021
United States

Antoine Hunter presented #DeafWoke with Jubil Khan livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 21 January at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

Podcast

Building Our Own Table Episode #4

20 January 2021

In this episode of Building Our Own Tables Podcast, host Viviana Vargas discusses amplifying Afrolatinx and Caribbean stories with an emphasis on women through media and entertainment with Blactina founder Nydia Simone.

a group onstage
Essay

A Conversation with Complex Movements

15 January 2021

In the last conversation of the Performing the Internet series, curator Kate Bergstrom sits down with three members of the Detroit-based artist-activist collective Complex Movements—Sage Crump, ill weaver, Wes Taylor—to talk about intentional engagement in a virtual world.

Podcast

Building Our Own Tables Episode #2

16 December 2020

In the second episode of Build Our Own Tables podcast, host Viviana Vargas interviews Lauren E. Turner of No Dream Deferred, a community anchored theatre production company in New Orleans, Louisiana. Your donation to Advancing Arts Forward supports liberated spaces that uplift, heal and encourage us to change the world.

hana sharif seated in a theatre
Podcast

Daughters of Lorraine Podcast Season 2 Episode 6

25 November 2020

For the last episode of season two of the Daughters of Lorraine Podcast, hosts Jordan Ealey and Leticia Ridley talk with Hana S. Sharif about her journey to becoming one of the first Black women to be artistic director of a regional theatre, managing in a pandemic, her thoughts on the current state of American theatre, and more.

DeafWoke with Janeshia Adams-Ginyard
Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 19 November 2020
United States

Antoine Hunter presented DeafWoke with Janeshia Adams-Ginyard livestreaming on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 19 November at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

black and white photo of four actors onstage
Podcast

Daughters of Lorraine Podcast Season 2 Episode 5

18 November 2020

In this episode, Daughters of Lorraine Podcast hosts Jordan Ealey and Leticia Ridley discuss how Black playwrights, such as Adrienne Kennedy, Tarrell Alvin McCraney, Suzan-Lori Parks, and Ntozake Shange, have experimented with form.

Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 5 October 2020
United States

Antoine Hunter Presented #DeafWoke with Def Lens Media livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 5 November at 4 p.m. PST (San Francisco, UTC -8) / 6 p.m. CST (Chicago, UTC -6) / 7 p.m. EST (New York, UTC -5).

Call and response event illustration.
Video

Featuring Toshi Reagon, Kwame Alexander, Jason Reynolds, Jacqueline Woodson and many more...

Friday 30 October 2020
Boston, Massachusetts, USA

ArtsEmerson presented Call and Response: A Black Lives Matter Q&A for Young People featuring Toshi Reagon, Kwame Alexander, Jason Reynolds, Jacqueline Woodson and many more... livestreaming on the global, commons-based peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Friday 30 October 2020 at 3:30 p.m. PDT (Los Angeles, UTC -7) / 5:30 p.m. (Chicago, UTC -5) / 6:30 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4) / 10:30 p.m. GMT (London, UTC +0).

Video

A virtual consciousness-raising online talk show, led by Black and Native American Deaf host Mr. Antoine Hunter PurpleFireCrow

Thursday 29 October 2020
United States

Antoine Hunter presented #DeafWoke with Rodney Burford livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 29 October at 4 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 6 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 7 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

portraits of panelists
Video

Part Three: To Be UNBOSSED ft. Hope Boykin, Dianne Smith, and Dane Figueroa Edidi

Thursday 29 October 2020
United States

NBT @ HOME presented an "Unbought & Unbossed" Conversation livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 29 October at 3 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 5 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 6 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

Photo of three conversation participants, with the event title and producers listed.
Video

With Star Finch, Ellen Sebastian Chang, and Lisa Marie Rollins, presented by Crowded Fire and Campo Santo.

Tuesday 27 October 2020
United States

Crowded Fire and Campo Santo presented the conversation On Radical Imagination & The Black Feminine Divine livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Tuesday 27 October 2020 at 2 p.m. HST (UTC -9) / 5 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 7 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 8 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

The Black Artist Coalition logo
Podcast

Daughters of Lorraine Podcast Season 2 Episode 4

28 October 2020

The Daughters of Lorraine Podcast hosts Jordan Ealey and Leticia Ridley discuss the advent of We See You, White American Theatre and situate it within a history of Black theatre artists calling out the white supremacy endemic to American theatre, as well as interviewing The Black Artist Coalition founders Vaughn Midder and Kevin McAllister.

Video

Featuring audio-play productions and guest interviews on afro-existential themes

Saturday 17 October 2020
United States

The Afro-Existential Podcast, part of the Broadway Podcast Network, presented Creating Art in the Time of Corona livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Saturday 17 September 2020 at 6:00 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 8:00 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 9:00 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

artist headshots with text details about the event.
Video

Part Two: Issues Facing Black Women's Lives and Liberation Today featuring Stephanie Young, Rhonda Ross, and DeRay Mckesson

Thursday 15 October 2020
United States

NBT @ HOME presented an "Unbought & Unbossed" Conversation livestreamed on the global, commons-based, peer produced HowlRound TV network at howlround.tv on Thursday 15 October at 3 p.m. PDT (San Francisco, UTC -7) / 5 p.m. CDT (Chicago, UTC -5) / 6 p.m. EDT (New York, UTC -4).

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