JIM FARMER • FEBRUARY 10, 2022

Humor against the backdrop of depression may sound like an uneasy pairing, but the play Every Brilliant Thing walks that fine line quite ably. Running through Feb. 27 at Horizon Theatre, it’s a production with a surprising amount of ambition and warmth. 

It’s also the 38th season opener for the Little Five Points playhouse, which has not staged a full show since early 2020.

Even before the curtain speech, O’Neil Delapenha, who serves as the Narrator of Every Brilliant Thing, mixes and mingles with the crowd and hands almost everyone inside at least one numbered slip of paper with text that he explains will be used throughout the evening. Then we quickly learn his story. At the young age of 7, his father takes him to a hospital where he learns that his mother has made a suicide attempt. This is new territory for the boy — his only brush with death/near death has been when a beloved family dog had to be put to sleep. 

Soon after, as a coping mechanism, he begins writing a list of everything that makes life worth living — beginning with ice cream, water fights, and staying up past bedtime and being allowed to watch TV. From time to time, he’ll call out a number on his list, and an audience member will respond with what that number represents. Patrons also perform as secondary characters such as Dad, Vet and a Lecturer. 

As he grows older and becomes a young adult, eventually going to college and later marrying, he continues the list while holding in his anger and trying to understand his mother and her unhappiness. Throughout his life, he has to deal with his highs and lows of her bouts of depression. 

Directed by Jeff Adler, Horizon Theatre’s co-artistic director, Every Brilliant Thing covers heavy material, yet — over the course of its 80-minute show run, sans an intermission — manages to be unexpectedly funny.

Because of Covid-19, Adler has three performers lined up for the lead role. Shelby Hofer and Megan Hayes are alternating performances with Delapenha, and it would be interesting to see how differently each approach the material. The playwrights have encouraged the role to be played by anyone — any sex, race or age.

Having seen Delapenha, however, it would be hard to imagine how anyone else can top his performance. A frequent actor and director at the Atlanta Shakespeare Company and the founder of Black Theatre Artists of Atlanta, he’s affable, relaxed and quick-witted, with several moments of improvisation. It’s a very physical role, too — the actor is almost constantly in motion, interacting with the patrons, singing more than a few times and at one point high fiving/fisting everyone in the audience.

Yet the actor isn’t afraid to reveal his vulnerable side as he is making sense of his mother’s sadness and trying to forge ahead with his own life. Mental illness is a central theme here, and the central character’s battles with his mother take a toll, even when he keeps a game face.  

What began as a short story by English playwright Duncan Macmillan became, with the help of Irish comedian Jonny Donahoe, a one-person show that debuted in 2013 at the Ludlow Fringe Festival. After an off-Broadway bow the next year, it began playing around the world and was also adapted by HBO. It’s easy to see how the production has caught on with audiences and theater companies.  

Every Brilliant Thing is a spare production with an intentionally threadbare set. Scenic and property designers Moriah and Isabel Curley-Clay hang items from the ceiling (picture frames, lamps, some albums), sprinkle books and various props throughout the audience and make the Narrator’s distributed numbers look authentic, like they could actually have been written by a child, often in crayon and on various forms of paper. 

Truth be told, as enjoyable as the production is, Every Brilliant Thing starts to run out of steam a bit near the end, feeling a little repetitive and drawn out. Yet it never wears out its welcome. While part of the play is indeed quite sad, Macmillan and Donahoe manage to keep it engaging and hopeful. Under Adler’s direction, actor Delapenha finds just the right tone in his performance. 

As I was inside the theater before the show began, I realized I had not seen a production at Horizon since Once in early 2020. Further reality set in as I realized that no one had seen a production at Horizon since then. Covid has wreaked havoc on theater companies, some of whom have resorted to streaming shows while others have held off until they felt comfortable enough again mounting live work. Horizon has been busy with some Zoom projects the last few years but has not staged any productions.   

During Omicron, when some theater companies aren’t even requiring vaccinations, Horizon deserves much credit for presenting a scaled-down, socially distant production. My audience numbered about 50 people, distanced and masked, with vaccinations checked at the door, and everyone seemed to feel relaxed and secure. 

Horizon’s new play may not be brilliant as its title suggests, but it’s certainly crowd-pleasing and thought-provoking. It seems — in many ways — a perfect show to stage at this time.  

::

Horizon Theatre requires masks and proof of vaccination or negative PCR test within 48 hours.

Adron McCann | WABE

February 2nd, 2022

Ice cream, water fights, staying up past your bedtime, and being allowed to watch TV – these maybe just be a few of life’s beautiful treasures when you’re a kid. Horizon Theatre’s production of “Every Brilliant Thing” explores a child’s growing list of what makes life worth living when their mother suddenly goes to the hospital for depression. Director Jeff Adler and actors O’Neil Delapenha and Megan Hayes joined “City Lights” host Lois Reitzes via Zoom to talk about the play’s unique way of sharing both joy and sadness with an interactive audience. The show opens Horizon’s 38th season and runs through Feb. 27.

“Every Brilliant Thing,” written by Duncan MacMillan and Johnny Donahoe, is a one-person performance but invites plenty of participation from its all-ages audiences, as well as flexibility in its singular stage role. “The playwright has suggested that the person who is telling the story could, and should, be of any gender, age, ethnicity, and so we have cast three actors to play the role and trade-in performance of the role,” said Adler. “So we have a variety of actors that tell the story on different nights.”

Delapenha, one of the three actors taking on the storyteller role, emphasized the range of emotions captured in the play’s narrative. “It’s very true-to-life in that sense of, one minute, you can be feeling on top of the world because you’ve just met someone new and everything feels different and fuzzy and tingling inside, but at the same time, you can be thinking about how the same feelings came up in a different scenario and how it went down a different road, and make you feel sad or question the validity of the joy you’re feeling now,” Delapenha said. “I think the playwright does a wonderful job of going in and out of highs and lows just as we do in everyday life.”

The actors regaled their interviewer in performing an excerpt from the play, a scene from when the play’s storyteller falls in love. The two actors each took on the role of storyteller, contributing their own “brilliant things” to the list of life’s little joys, like “friendly cats,” “watching someone watching your favorite film,” and “falling asleep as soon as you get on the plane, waking up when you land and feeling like a time traveler.” In the actual theater, Delapenha would, at this point, undertake the project of fist-bumping every member of the audience. 

“You notice, on the list, every item of brilliant thing has its own number,” said Adler. “During the show, I hope I’m not giving too much away to say that audience participants are given some of the numbers with the thing to read out. So at times, the teller does not call out; someone in the audience calls out, ‘roller coasters,’ or whatever is the next thing on that list with the number that they have.”

Hayes shared her appreciation for the kind of compassionate conversation the play invites about issues like depression, as she comes from a family familiar with these struggles. “There’s not a lot of forums, safe forums to talk about these things,” she said. “We bottle things up and don’t speak of them, and what I love about this play so much is that it’s talked about in a very disarming and funny, at times, way, that really I’m hoping will resonate and connect me as a storyteller with the audience.”

Horizon Theatre’s production of “Every Brilliant Thing” takes place from Jan. 28 – Feb. 27, every day of the week, with multiple performances on weekend days. More information and tickets are available at http://horizontheatre.com/plays/every-brilliant-thing/. 

ARTSATL STAFF·JANUARY 14, 2022

Having not staged a full-scale production in nearly two years due to Covid-19, Horizon Theatre has announced that it will launch its 38th season later this month with Every Brilliant Thing, a play about depression and resilience told in collaboration with the audience.  It will be presented with a reduced-capacity, in-the-round seating configuration at the Little Five Points theater with previews beginning January 28. The run is through February 27.

Resilience is also a capacity that Horizon is exhibiting by returning to present live theater even as some companies are postponing openings due to the virus surge caused by the Omicron variant.

In September, when most other Atlanta troupes were scrambling to launch their fall seasons, Horizon co-artistic director Lisa Adler told ArtsATL, “We debated starting in the fall, but ultimately over the summer, we decided, let’s use this time to get organized so that we can come out of the pandemic in a better place than we left.”  .

The pandemic is still very much with us, but, with multiple safety precautions in place, Adler says she’s comfortable with the decision to return now.

“We planned for a small show in this timeframe to open the season to make sure we could be as safe as possible as we re-open — for actors, staff and audience,” she says.

Horizon has cast three actors to alternate in Every Brilliant Thing’s single role (and serve as backups for each other) — O’Neil Delapenha, Megan Hayes and Shelby Hofer. Two stage managers (both of whom already have had Covid) also will rotate in that job. Masks will be required in the theater (except for the one performer), and audience members must provide proof of vaccination. All actors and staff are boosted, Adler says, and testing is frequent. In addition to reducing  capacity, Horizon will assign seating to allow for greater distancing

“Theater is a live experience, and we are excited to be back for audiences who are longing to reconnect with live theater, especially with this funny and touching play that is all about connection, hope and resilience in the face of dark times,” Adler said. “I think we all can relate to that right now.”

Every Brilliant Thing indeed promises to be a spirit-lifter. In Duncan Macmillan’s script, a seven-year-old boy responds to his mother’s attempted suicide by starting a list of things to live for: No. 1 being ice cream; No. 2, water fights; and No. 3, staying up past your bedtime and being allowed to watch TV. The list grows over the decades in the play, expanding to a million entries, and will grow even more with feedback from the Horizon audience, elicited by the three actors.

“This is not like any show I have ever seen before,” director Jeff Adler, Horizon’s co-artistic director has said. “It’s intimate and personal with the actor interacting directly with the audience before and during the play. Every night will be a different experience, with each actor and audience bringing their own stamp to the play.”

Following Every Brilliant Thing on Horizon’s schedule will be The Light, March 18-April 17; Roe, May 6-June 12; Square Blues, July 8-August 14; and Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812, September 30-November 6.

More on Horizon’s Covid protocols HERE. Tickets and information, HERE.

A Timely and Life-Affirming Story of Life’s Miracles and Finding Hope

Horizon Theatre Company will return to live performance and open its 38th season with the critically acclaimed Every Brilliant Thing, a unique, interactive show about how a child’s list of all the wonderful things in the world transforms a family’s life as the list grows over decades.  This refreshing play, told in collaboration with the audience in an intimate in-the-round setting, has touched audiences around the world.  Horizon’s production of this solo tour de force will feature three actors who will rotate in the role at different performances, telling the story of the list and its impact as it expands to a million items. 

Horizon Theatre Company’s performances start January 28, 2022 (Press Opening February 4, 2022) and run until February 27, 2022 at Horizon in Little Five Points/Inman Park (1083 Austin Avenue N.E., Atlanta, GA 30307, at the corner of Euclid and Austin Avenues). Performances are Mon through Fri at 8pm, Thursdays at 11am, Saturdays at 3 and 8pm, Sundays at 1 and 5pm.  Tickets and information are available at www.horizontheatre.com or 404-584-7450.

1)Ice cream. 2) Water fights. 3) Staying up past your bedtime and being allowed to watch TV. One fall day, a child begins a list of everything that makes life worth living when his/her mother is in the hospital recovering from “being sad”.   As time passes, the list grows and becomes an epic chronicle of life’s small joys that impacts the storyteller in unexpected ways, offering light and hope in the dark corners.  This funny and emotional journey charts the lengths we will go for those we love–and draws on the audience’s help to tell the story.  

The story-teller will be played by three separate actors, performing on different nights of the Horizon run.  Horizon favorite Megan Hayes is an actor of stage and screen (The Hunger Games: Catching Fire) who is currently the co-host of Horizon’s Southbound: True Life Tales from the ATL and has been seen at Horizon in Waffle Palace Christmas, Sex with Strangers, Tree and The Santaland Diaries.  O’Neil Delapenha has been working virtually with Horizon for the past year, including the The Ghosts of Little Five Points and his own spoken word and story-telling.  He is a regular performer and director at the Atlanta Shakespeare Company and founder of Black Theatre Artists of Atlanta. Shelby Hofer has been onstage at Horizon frequently in earlier years, including the hilarious solo show, Bad Dates.  She is very familiar with solo performance as she has recently developed and performed her own one-woman show, High Risk, Baby! about her wild and epic journey into motherhood.   She is co-Founder of PushPush Arts which now manages an arts incubator facility for local artists in College Park dedicated to fostering innovation in all artistic disciplines. 

“This is not like any show I have ever seen before,” says director Jeff Adler, Horizon’s Co-Artistic Director. “It’s intimate and personal with the actor interacting directly with the audience before and during the play.  Every night will be a different experience with each actor and audience bringing their own stamp to the play. We have reduced the seating capacity of the theatre and included playing spaces throughout the audience to increase the intimacy while keeping COVID safe.  The show is filled with humor, joy, and hope, even though it tackles the very serious topic of mental health and its legacy in a family.  Audiences will leave feeling uplifted, more connected to their loved ones, and hopefully appreciative of all the small miracles that make life worth living every day.”

Every Brilliant Thing began as an adaptation of a short story by Duncan MacMillan, performed by him and others, and he worked on it for over a decade and several incarnations before it became the full-length play it is today.  Actor and stand-up comedian Jonny Donahue eventually took on the role, and it was first produced in this version by Paines Plough and Pentabus Theatre Company in June 2013 at Ludlow Fringe Festival in Great Britain. It premiered off-Broadway at the Barrow Street Theatre in December 2014.  Jonny Donahoe received a Drama Desk Award nomination for his performance, and both he and writer Duncan Macmillan received Lucille Lortel Award nominations. The show was so well received that it led to a television adaptation for HBO.  The current script was published after two years of devising and performing around the UK and NYC for hundreds of audiences, and the play has now been produced by theatresall over the country and the world.

The design team includes Horizon resident set designers and multiple Suzi Award-winners Moriah and Isabel Curley-Clay, along with Horizon resident lighting designer Mary Parker. The Curley-Clay sisters have designed all of Horizon’s productions for the past 10+ years, and Mary has also lit most of those productions. 

Every Brilliant Thing performances are Mondays through Fridays at 8pm, Saturdays at 3 and 8pm, Sundays at 1pm and 5pm, and Thursday matinees at 11am. Seating capacity is reduced for this production to increase intimacy and to allow for more space between audiences.

Tickets start at $30 for weekdays and $35 for weekends. ($20 anytime full-time students under 25 with a valid student ID and $3 off full price tickets for seniors).  Prices are subject to change and will rise as performances fill up. Patrons are encouraged to purchase tickets early for best prices. Group discounts are available for parties of 10 or more. Tickets can be purchased here: https://tickets.horizontheatre.com/events

Although aspects of mental health are approached from a positive perspective and the play is about resilience and hope, Every Brilliant Thing does address the topics of depression and suicide.   

For this and all performances, Horizon is committed to being COVID safe. The theatre will follow its COVID policy and procedures, including proof of vaccines or a negative PCR COVID Test within 48 hours for all audience members, artists, and staff.  In addition, the actors will be tested before every performance.  Masks are required for all patrons and staff. Enhanced cleaning and sanitation throughout the theatre will be conducted after each performance.  For this show, our seating capacity is reduced to allow some distancing.  Seating will be assigned, and seating assignments given on arrival to the theatre.  Horizon’s full COVID policy and procedures can be found at: https://www.horizontheatre.com/covid-19-policies-procedures/ 

For tickets and information, visit horizontheatre.com or call the Box Office at 404.584.7450.

---

ACTOR AND CREATIVE TEAM BIOS:

MEGAN HAYES is thrilled to return to Horizon Theatre for Every Brilliant Thing. Hayes is an award-winning writer, storyteller, and actor. She has appeared at the Horizon in Waffle Palace Christmas, Sex with Strangers, Tree and Santaland Diaries to name a few. Her film and Television credits include The Hunger Games: Catching Fire, Emmy nominated Dolly Parton’s Heartstrings: These Old Bones, Eastbound & Down. She currently Co-Hosts Horizon’s Southbound: True Life Tales from the ATL and Beyond with Brittani Minnieweather. Megan dedicates her performance to the memory of her mom, Sarah.

O’NEIL DELAPENHA is an actor, director, and all around storyteller currently based in Atlanta. He’s originally from South Florida and received his BFA degree in acting from New World School of the Arts. Previous acting credits include : James T in Barbecue at Portland Playhouse, Candy Corn and other characters in The Ghosts of Little Five Points at Horizon Theatre Company, and Parolles in “All’s Well That Ends Well” at The Shakespeare Tavern Playhouse. O’Neil believes that the best stories are the ones that shift and mold around the very people bearing witness to them. That shared experience is what truly bridges the gap between audience and performer. Which is why, after reading the script once, he knew he wanted to be a part of this show—to help create and share in those experiences/ You may also catch O’Neil onstage at The Shakespeare Tavern Playhouse, performing as Lord Capulet in Romeo & Juliet select night’s throughout the month of February. Follow him on Instagram at oneild14 

SHELBY HOFER is an actor, writer, and Co-director at PushPush Arts, where she develops distinctive opportunities for artists to explore new ideas and collaborate across the globe. She has appeared on many stages over the last two decades locally, nationally, and internationally. In Atlanta, her stage performances include multiple productions at Horizon, including The Good Times Are Killing Me, Escape from Happiness, Almost Maine, and Bad Dates. Her performances of 101 Humiliating Stories (Lisa Kron) at PushPush garnered numerous awards including one of the Top 50 Shows of the Decade and a Best Actress award from Creative Loafing. Prior to the pandemic, she performed standup for three years while she was creating her most recent project, High Risk, Baby!, an autobiofictional comedy about a woman’s inner child clashing with her grown-up self, as she tempts fate with a journey to an in-vitro clinic in Ukraine. This show marks her 8th at Horizon, and she is thrilled to be back.

JEFF ADLER (Director) is co-founder and co-artistic/technical director of Horizon Theatre Company. He has directed more than 30 plays for Horizon including critically acclaimed and popular productions of Sex with Strangers by Laura Eason, The Book Club Play by Karen Zacarias, Superior Donuts by Tracey Letts, The Santaland Diaries by David Sedaris, Madame Melville by Richard Nelson, The Lonesome West by Martin McDonough, and All in the Timing and Mere Mortals by David Ives.  From 1995-2010, he led the Horizon Theatre Senior Ensemble, an outreach program that trained seniors in acting and playwriting and toured plays by and about seniors. He is in this seventh year serving as the drama teacher for The New School through Horizon’s partnership with this innovative intown high school.  He also directs Horizon Theatre’s technical and production staff and manages the facility. He studied at the Goodman School of Drama and holds a BA in Theatre from Roosevelt University.

ISABEL CURLEY-CLAY and MORIAH CURLEY CLAY (Resident Scenic Designers) are award-winning scenic designers whose work can be seen around Atlanta and on regional stages across the U.S. As Horizon’s resident scenic designers, they have designed all of Horizon’s productions for the past ten years.) Some favorite Horizon credits include scenic design for The Cake, Citizens Market (Suzi Award, 2018), How to Use A Knife, Avenue Q (Suzi Award 2011), Time Stands Still (Suzi Award 2013). Other select credits include The Magic Negro (Alliance Theatre); Dot (True Colors/Billie Holliday Theatre NYC); Slow Food (Theatrical Outfit); A Doll’s House Part 2 (Actor’s Express); Paradise Blue (Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre); Bright Star (Florida Studio Theatre), Two Trains Running (Triad Stage). Isabel and Moriah are the recipients of multiple Suzi Bass Awards for both scenic and costume design. They were featured in American Theatre Magazine’s “Inaugural Roll Call, 7 Theatrical People To Watch.” They are Artistic Associates at Theatrical Outfit, teach Scenography at Spelman College and are members of IATSE, United Scenic Artists 829.

It is often true that if you don’t set an intention for something you want to happen, it won’t.

It’s also true that if you don’t put dedicated action behind the intention, it certainly won’t come to pass.

Take, for instance, Horizon Theatre Company’s desire to expand its Black audience as well as produce more plays by Black playwrights. For nearly 20 years, the theater has tried to build both constituencies, first by showcasing one play each summer designed to appeal to Black audiences, particularly Black women. In a city such as Atlanta, with a significant and engaged Black cultural class, the move made sense even if it did give the appearance of earmarking one show a season as The Black Show. While Black people attended other productions throughout a season, and non-Black audiences attended the summer show, the Black audience was underserved. Then, three or four years ago, the theater decided to add another play to its annual season schedules, again, aimed at Black or non-white audiences.

Despite the number of Black playwrights out there working, the Horizon found it often got out-bid by other local theaters for the rights to produce popular plays by Black artists. It also didn’t have as many relationships as it wanted to with young, up-and-coming playwrights of color who would trust the theater with their work as they were trying to establish themselves as writers to watch.

“We are struggling every year to find things that we want to produce, that the audience wants to see,” said Lisa Adler, co-founder and co-artistic producing director of the Horizon. “So we said, let’s see if we can put a pipeline in place to make that happen.”

The result is a new initiative called the “New Georgia Woman Project: Black Women Speak.” Organized and led by Marguerite Hannah, Horizon’s Associate Artistic producer, the project is designed to be an incubator for both established and newer playwrights. In an effort to make sure the resulting work resonates with its target audience, this summer the theater invited 170 Black women from across metro Atlanta — some Horizon patrons, some not — to participate in virtual “coffee chats.”

In 21 chats held since July, the topics have ranged from parenting to traveling to health and religion, all through the experience of going through this life as a Black woman. The program’s inaugural nine playwrights joined the chats, mostly to listen. It’s from these candid conversations that the Horizon is hopeful their company will become more diverse, and writers of color will get a better shot at having their work produced.

“We’re not a monolith and we’re tired of the larger population thinking of us as a monolith,” said Hannah.

“It’s all valid”

Hannah said the theater did a national search for the playwrights but required them to either have a strong connection to the South or live in the South.

There are four established playwrights: CandriceJones, AriDy Knox, A’ndrea J. Wilson, and Shay Youngblood. The emerging playwrights are: Tramaine Brathwaite, Amina McIntyre, Chiwuzo Ife Okwumabua, Kelundra Smith and Dana L. Stringer.

That the program is launching now is significant. Adler said the Horizon, along with other theaters across the country, have faced an onslaught of criticism since the killing of George Floyd by police forced a racial reckoning in many corners of American life. After the scathing manifesto, “We See You White American Theatre,” was conceived and released by some of theater’s most celebrated artists, directors and producers of color (and a few white allies) last summer, theaters around the country have been grappling with its mandate: do better with inclusion and diversity both onstage and off.

“We know that in the theater world, it is top of mind of every single conversation that I have,” Adler said. “There is no conversation in which that is not at least part of the subject matter of whatever meeting I’m in, and we’ve been in a lot of meetings nationally and locally.”

The national conversations struck a nerve: At least seven new plays opening on Broadway this fall are by Black writers. According to a New York Times report, in the three years prior to the pandemic, there had only been three, total.

Adler said her theater — as well as others locally — has had its share of criticism as well.

“We have not been immune,” Adler said. “It’s all valid and we try to do better.”

“Hear these stories”

The Horizon produced writer Shay Youngblood’s early work in the late 1980s, in what was the start of the artist’s long, prolific career. Youngblood has sat in on several of the coffee chats. So far about 70 of the invited women have joined at least one gathering. Youngblood said that while the conversations have been valuable to her as a Black woman, as a playwright she often works in isolation creating trajectories for imaginary Black lives that she’s hopeful resonate with real women. The chats have created a community of other playwrights like her, she said, but they’ve also given her the chance to hear the unvarnished thoughts of Black women struggling with life but also rejoicing in it.

“What has grown out of the coffee chats has been unbelievable,” Hannah said. “It has become like bridge clubs used to be in my mother’s generation. At the end of it you hear women say, ‘Wow. This was so good I don’t need to go to therapy this week. We have common bonds. We’re affirming each other, but honoring our diversity.”

In a recent conversation about travel, there were stories of trips to far flung places pre-pandemic, but one woman confessed that travel wasn’t a priority for her because of her family’s finances. But the woman has come up with an alternative.

“She and some other friends get together and go out and just for a night they’re not mommies,” Youngblood said. “It gives them a chance to be themselves.”

Another upcoming chat will be about the men in their lives. But even with such unfettered access to private thoughts, Youngblood said neither she nor any of the other writers are scripting plays directly based on what they hear or on any one person. Instead, the conversations are serving as catalysts for larger stories.

“I’m writing to and for Black women, but I’m not writing only for Black women,” Youngblood said. “I want other people to come to the theater and hear these stories and perhaps be educated.”

The established writers turn early drafts of their work in to Hannah in November and by late January or early February there will be public readings of some of the plays. The emerging writers will turn in drafts in spring. Then, some time in 2023 or perhaps even late 2022, some of those works will make it to the Horizon stage.

“Black Women Speak initiative aims to give voice to real stories seldom told in theater”

ALEXIS HAUK
OCTOBER 28, 2021

Horizon Theatre Company kicks off an innovative initiative, the New Georgia Woman Project: Black Women Speak, this weekend. This “Fall First Look” at the project offers audiences, both in person and over Zoom, the opportunity to not only watch stories forged from real conversations but also the chance to meet and discuss the work with the artists driving it.

Black Women Speak is the brainchild of Horizon Associate Artistic Producer Marguerite Hannah, who said the idea grew out of the dramatic collision of different ideas accelerated by the events of 2020.

Horizon Theatre Associate Artistic Producer Marguerite Hannah had the seed of an idea that evolved into the New Georgia Woman Project: Black Women Speak.

Hannah, who serves on the boards for Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Alliance Theatre, Arena Stage and others, said she kept having conversations early in the pandemic with fellow arts professionals about whether the arts are essential. This fed into her gnawing concern about how the arts could possibly be so if art-makers no longer knew their own audiences and communities well, she said.

And then there was the fact that not enough stories about Black women were being told on stage — something that Hannah had experienced firsthand for 35 years as an actor, producer and director.

“For me, it was important not only to expand the theatrical canon of plays about and by Black women but to hear from everyday Black women,” she said. “Right now, we are all in the shadow of our sisters that are at the forefront of changing the world or holding back the walls of the dams. But it was also, ‘What are women like me thinking? The ones that aren’t being written up and profiled on MSNBC. What are we thinking, what are we feeling?’

To develop the Black Women Speak plays, Horizon commissioned nine playwrights — four relatively established writers and five emerging talents — and gathered more than 150 Black women from metro Atlanta and across the South to join a series of small group conversations. Hannah said that this turned into 25-plus two-hour “Coffee Chats” over Zoom since the kickoff in June.

The conversations would begin with prompts, with topics ranging from travel, voting, religion, or even more specific questions such as one about the fictional African country from Marvel Comics: “If Wakanda were a real place, what part of it would you want?”

Hannah carefully organized each session to keep them small and intimate, around six to 12 participants on average. The playwrights often would join, but also could watch the recordings afterwards. The space they fostered together throughout the process has been described as safe, open and inclusive. And at times, in ways that were sometimes surprising to Hannah, it sparked catharsis.

“At the end of the chat one night, this woman said, ‘This has been so good I don’t think I need to go to therapy,’” she recalled. “The conversations were able to celebrate who you are but also talk about traveling, taking a nap, having permission to say no.”

From these Coffee Chats, the nine playwrights are creating new scripts, featuring dynamic Black women characters, in a wide variety of genres and formats. The chats will continue into 2022 and, as part of the project, Horizon will nurture the plays toward full-fledged production over the next five years. 

The four established playwrights who will have scenes showcased at the “First Look” are Candrice Jones (The Golden Hours), AriDy Nox (Homegirls), A’ndrea J. Wilson (Lead Me Home) and Shay Youngblood (Boss Black Ladies and Tender-hearted Girls).

“I was jazzed about the idea of creating a show in deep concert with Black women,” said New York playwright AriDy Nox.

A New York City resident who grew up in Stone Mountain and earned her bachelor’s degree at Spelman College, Nox said that her ties to the South and specifically Atlanta continue to inform her work as a writer. That’s a factor in why she felt drawn to this project.

“The real insight that comes from listening to Black women within our particular social context has always been a huge underlying concept of my plays,” she said. “I was jazzed about the idea of creating a show in deep concert with Black women about what does it mean to return to our roots and for playwrights to be amplifiers and megaphones for the community.”

Gravitating toward magical realism and science fiction, Nox has penned works including a “historical reimagining” of the life of Sally Hemmings, Black Girl in Paris (2020), and the “afrofuturist ecopocalypse musical” Metropolis (2019). “Weird is a good descriptor of most of the things I write,” said the Tisch School of the Performing Arts at NYU graduate.

Shay Youngblood, whose playwrighting credits include Shaking the Mess Out of Misery, Talking Bones and Amazing Grace, calls her Boss Ladies and Tender-hearted Girls a “love letter to all Black women.

“I want people to come to this play and walk away feeling new ways of looking at this present moment and the future,” Youngblood said. “I want them to laugh and laugh so hard, they cry. I want them to experience some of the emotions that these women inspired in me.”

The casts for each show include some newer performers along with Atlanta favorites, including Cynthia D. Barker and Enoch King. The writers will workshop their plays in November and December before moving into full readings in January and February.

Along with that initial core of four writers,Horizon also has formed an Emerging Playwrights Collective that includes five Atlanta-based playwrights, Tramaine Brathwaite, Amina McIntyre, Chiwuzo Ife Okwumabua, Kelundra Smith and Dana Stringer. These writers will have their plays read in summer 2022.

Both cohorts will have full readings next year for theaters that are members of the National New Play Network, with the aim of landing a full-scale production for each of the nine new plays.

“First Look” performances will take place in person at 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday at the Alpharetta Arts Center and November 5-7 at Horizon Theatre. Each night will also be livestreamed on Zoom. In-person and virtual tickets are free and available here. COVID policies for the theater can be found here.

A Groundbreaking Project Amplifying the Stories and Voices of Black Women 

(Atlanta, GA) – Horizon Theatre Company announces the launch of the nationally recognized New Georgia Woman Project: Black Women Speak (BWS) program to develop plays that will amplify the voices of African-American women.  BWS is a groundbreaking initiative to create works of and by Black women and for all, inspired by conversations with real Black women of Georgia.  Horizon through Black Women Speak has commissioned a cohort of nine Black female playwrights to create new plays to bring to the stage the stories, lives, and concerns of Black women.  Black Women Speak is the recipient of the National New Play Network (NNPN) inaugural Bridge Program funding awarded to only 18 theaters in the US and an innovation grant from the National Alliance for Musical Theatre.

One year after America’s latest period of social reckoning, the BWS initiative seeks to explore the question: What are Black women thinking, feeling, and doing now? 

Led by Horizon’s Associate Artistic Producer Marguerite Hannah, Horizon’s BWS team has gathered to date over 150 Black women in and from the Atlanta metro area and across the south to join Horizon for a series of small group conversations or Coffee Chats.  Conducted via Zoom, Coffee Chats have brought together Black women to meet, share life stories, engage, and grow in community with one another. They include women from various backgrounds, including career professionals and business owners, physicians, educators, community activists, stay-at mothers, and retirees. In turn, these chats are inspiring nine playwrights to create new scripts featuring dynamic Black female characters to expand the canon of work by Black women writers. Through this project, Horizon aims to seed plays that will be produced on our stage over the next five years, beginning in 2023. 

Though these plays will be based on the thoughts and feelings of Black women in Atlanta and across Georgia, the goal is to create works that resonate with Black women nationwide and with audiences of all genders and races.  These powerful stories will be developed by and grounded in the cultures of Black women. This increased canon of work by female playwrights of color will positively impact audiences, the American theatre, and the world by expanding the narrative of Black voices.  We will also provide artistic opportunities for BIPOC actors and creative teams as these scripts continue to develop into full productions. 

The BWS Playwright Artists Cohort of four playwrights developing plays for Black Women Speak includes: Candrice Jones, AriDy Nox, A’ndrea J. Wilson, and Shay Youngblood. The BWS Emerging Playwrights Collective of five playwrights includes Tramaine Brathwaite, Amina McIntyre, Chiwuzo Ife Okwumabua, Kelundra Smith, Dana Stringer (biographies for each playwright are listed below).

The power of the BWS project is best exemplified by the words of Associate Artistic Producer Marguerite Hannah: The past, present, and future of Black America cannot be told without referencing Atlanta and its people. We have political power, culture, wealth, higher education, and a proud history as the cradle of the Civil Rights Movement. The cultural upheaval of 2020 has stirred many powerful images of Black women and their impact on the landscape of America. We must not miss the opportunity to use our art to give voice to these times.

Horizon Co-Artistic/Producing Director, Lisa Adler shares: Our goal through this project is to develop new relationships with artists and audiences who will have an ongoing, long-term connection with Horizon and the BWS project. We hope and believe that these relationships will also generate new connections for Horizon Theatre, helping to create a more diverse and equitable organization on all levels.

Horizon has invited Black women from across Georgia to participate in our Coffee Chats, beginning with our audiences and branching out from there.   We are honored to partner with the City of Alpharetta and Alpharetta Arts Center to reach audiences in the North Fulton area for Coffee Chats and with upcoming readings.   

Readings of excerpts from the works in development for Black Women Speak will be held virtually and in person at the Alpharetta Arts Center October 29-30, 2021 and at Horizon November 5-7, 2021.   More details and reservation/watch information will be announced in October.  Development and public readings of the BWS full-length plays will begin in 2022, and production of selected BWS plays will begin as part of Horizon’s 39^th season in 2023.

Anyone nationwide interested in the project is encouraged to sign up to receive updates by filling out the first page of our BWS survey.  Black women of Georgia can fill out as much of the survey as they like and request to join us for a Coffee Chat:  https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/bwsparticipants

Or visit the Black Women Speak page on the Horizon Theatre website for more information and regular updates: https://www.horizontheatre.com/black-women-speak/

# # # 

BLACK WOMEN SPEAK PLAYWRIGHT ARTISTS COHORT

Candrice Jones is a Steinberg awarded playwright from Dermott, Arkansas. Candrice’s artistic mission is to write love letters for and to women of the American South. A VONA Playwriting alum and CalArts Critical Studies MFA recipient, she has been a resident fellow at Ground Floor housed by the Berkeley Rep, the Bay Area Playwrights’ Festival, and MacDowell’s Colony of the Arts. She is scheduled to be a resident playwright at Djerassi’s Colony of the Arts in the fall of 2022. Candrice has received the Many Voices  (2020) and Jerome Fellowship (2021) from The Playwrights’ Center . Her play, FLEX, was developed at VONA, Ground Floor, the Bay Area Playwrights’ Festival, and was scheduled to premiere at Actors Theater of Louisville’s Humana Festival of New American Plays, but was cancelled due to COVID. In the 2020-21 season, Candrice received virtual commissions from People’s Light Theater (Leaving Teaching) and Actors Theater of Louisville (Beyond the Crossroads), as well as reading opportunities from Theatrical Outfit, National New Play Network, and San Francisco Playhouse. Recently, Candrice’s full length play, A Medusa Thread, received a reading in UC Santa Barbara’s BIPOC Reading Series where it will go on to receive a preview production scheduled in spring of 2022.  Currently, Candrice excited about opportunities she has received from Virginia’s Signature Theater to collaborate with composer Nolan Williams as well as upcoming opportunities with Horizon Theatre’s Black Women Speak playwriting lab, and Orchard Project’s 2021 Episodic Lab. In May 2021, she took on the role of Director of New Programs at The Arkansas Repertory Theater in Little Rock, AR where she is in the midst of creating opportunities for playwrights who focus on the American South.

 _____________________________________________________

AriDy Nox is a multi-disciplinary Black femme storyteller and social activist with a variety of forward-thinking creative works under her/their belt including the historical reimagining of the life of Sally Hemmings Black Girl in Paris (2020), the ancestral reckoning play A Walless Church (2019), the afrofuturist ecopocalypse musical Metropolis (2019), and many others. AriDy writes with a fervent belief that creating a future in which marginalized peoples are free requires a radical imagination. 

Their tales are offerings intended to function as small parts of an ancient, expansive, awe-inspiring tradition of world-shaping, created by and for black femmes. As a graduate of the Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program at Tisch School of the Performing Arts at NYU and a beneficiary of the Emerging Writer’s Group at the Public Theatre, she has been inordinately privileged to share the workings of her imagination among a vast array of inspiring and supportive artists of various radical backgrounds throughout the city. 

_____________________________________________________

A’ndrea J. Wilson, Ph.D. is a multi-medium creative writer, educator, and speaker. She integrates her clinical background, interest in interpersonal/intrapersonal development, and love for the African-American community with storytelling. A’ndrea holds a B.S. in Psychology, a M.S. in Counseling Psychology; an MFA in Dramatic Writing, and a Ph.D. in Global Leadership.

A’ndrea works has been nominated for the Kennedy Center’s Graduate Playwrights Workshop, and selected for readings at the National Black Theatre Festival. An alumnus of the Savannah College of Art and Design, A’ndrea was the recipient of a 2017-2018 Alumni Atelier Award/Ambassadorship, a quarter-long writing residency. A’ndrea is also the Braida Endowed Chair of Creative Writing, and the Director of Diversity and Inclusion Initiatives at Grand View University. She teaches English, Creative Writing, and Theatre courses. 

_____________________________________________________________

Shay Youngblood is a writer, visual artist, and educator. She is the author of several novels including Black Girl in Paris, collections of short stories and numerous essays. Her published plays including Shaking the Mess Out of Misery, Talking Bones and Amazing Grace, a stage adaptation of a children’s book (all produced by Horizon), have been widely produced and her short stories have been performed at Symphony Space and recorded for NPR’s Selected Shorts. In 2021 she was appointed Commissioner to the Japan U.S. Friendship Commission and serves as a board member of Yaddo artists’ community. Her current projects include an illustrated children’s books, a super hero graphic novel collaboration, a radio play and The Architecture of Soul Sounda multi-media performance work about architecture, memory and the environment inspired by research in Japan, China and the U.S. 

_____________________________________________________________

BLACK WOMEN SPEAK EMERGING PLAYWRIGHTS COLLECTIVE

Tramaine Brathwaite is a Guyanese-American playwright and writes about topics that are honest, uncomfortable, and sometimes taboo. She believes that life is a play waiting to happen…just write. Some of her written plays include: Unnerving Stains, Enigma, Last Train to Glen Echo, Point…Blank…Period!, and Count It All Joy. She also wrote and produced a short film entitled Unheard. Tramaine was a 2015-2016 Horizon Theatre Company Apprentice, 2016-2017 Working Title Playwrights Rhame Scholarship recipient, a 2017-2018 Atlanta Women in Theatre Mentorship recipient, and is a member of The Dramatist Guild.  In 2017, Tramaine was published in The Louisville Review No. 81. She holds a B.S. in Business from the University of Maryland College Park and a Masters in Arts Management from Carnegie Mellon University. She uses her experiences and writes pieces that speak to the realities around her. Tramaine is a Maryland native residing in Hampton, GA.

_____________________________________________________________

Amina McIntyre is a playwright from Atlanta, GA, who has had productions and readings of her plays with Working Title Playwrights at OnStage Atlanta, TipMyCup Productions at the Roy Arias Theater in New York, Wabash College, Colby College, Lenoir-Rhyne University, Spalding University, Indiana Theater Association ITWorks 2008, West Side Community CME Church, Sabrina McKenzie Ministries’ EPIC Women’s Conference, Lenoir-Rhyne University and the Hickory Museum of Art. Amina received a BA in Anthropology at Colby College, a MA in African American and African Diaspora Studies from Indiana University, Bloomington, a MFA in Creative Writing from Spalding University and a MTS from Emory University. She is a member of Working Title Playwrights, an Atlanta-based play development company, and Managing Director of Karibu Performing Arts, LLC/Songs of Karibu. Recently she presented her play All’s Fair in Jewels and Dresses at the Fort Wayne Fringe Festival and she was an invited playwright for the Atlanta One Minute Play Festival.

_____________________________________________________________

Chiwuzo Ife Okwumabua (Chi Ife) has over ten years of experience in arts administration and the performing arts. She has worked as a show producer, production manager, lyricist, and actress for various productions nationally and internationally. As a producer, she is passionate about presenting innovative bodies of work that empower and create social change. As a lyricist and writer, her mission is to create original work that is thought-provoking, elevates audiences to a higher state of consciousness, and motivates people to live their best life. The original work that she creates is influenced by West African and Black American culture. Ife is the creator, songwriter, and co-writer of A Song for Adaeze, an original Afro-Futurism musical production. Presentations of Adaeze have been featured at The Atlanta Black Theater Festival, Art on the Beltline, Push Through Arts Festival, and will be a part of the 2022 Atlanta Musical Theater Festival.

_____________________________________________________________

Kelundra Smith is a theatre critic, arts journalist, and playwright whose mission is to connect people to cultural experiences and each other. Her work has been published in: The New York Times, Food & Wine, American Theatre Magazine, Bitter Southerner, TDF Stages, ArtsATL, Atlanta Magazine, and many other publications. She holds a bachelor’s degrees in magazine journalism and theatre from the University of Georgia and her master’s degree from the Goldring Arts Journalism program at Syracuse University.

Kelundra is a member of the Society of Professional Journalists and the American Theatre Critics Association, where she serves on the executive committee and the equity, diversity & inclusion committee. She has been a fellow at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre Center’s National Critics Institute and guest critic at the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival. Today, she primarily reviews plays by and about diverse people from marginalized communities and writes articles about artistic works created by women and people of color.

_____________________________________________________________

Dana L. Stringer is a playwright, poet, screenwriter, and writing instructor with an MA in Creative Writing from Antioch University Los Angeles. She is an adjunct creative writing instructor in the Inspiration2Publication program at Antioch University Online. Dana has served as a guest playwright and judge for the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival and serves currently as the Artist-in-Residence at Out of Hand Theater. 

Her recent play, We the Village, was selected for Theatrical Outfit’s Made in Atlanta new play development program and the Unexpected Play Festival (2020), as well as Working Title Playwright’s First Light Series (2018). Dana’s work have been presented by Alabama Shakespeare Festival, The Billie Holiday Theatre, Black Theatre Network, Vanguard Repertory Company, Ain’t I a Woman Playfest, Blue Pearl Theatrics, National Black Theatre Festival, Fade to Black Play Festival, and MoJo Fest, amongst other companies. She is a member of the Dramatist Guild and Working Title Playwrights.

_____________________________________________________________

Horizon Associate Artistic Producer Marguerite Hannah will be the lead artist on the project. She is a Black female, Producer, director, and actor with over 30 years in the industry and 15 years at Horizon. She has been in a leadership role at Horizon for 15 years, serving as business manager first, director of the Horizon Apprentice Company, and now director and Producer. She began her 30-year professional acting career as an actor at Horizon. She is a graduate of Howard University in Washington, D.C., another “Black Mecca.” In addition to her work at Horizon,  Marguerite Hannah is also working to further equity in the theatre industry through leadership positions with the National New Play Network (where she serves as the current Board Secretary) and the National Alliance for Musical Theatre (where she serves on the Board and Co-Chair of the NAMT Festival)

_____________________________________________________________

Horizon Theatre Company connects people, inspires hope, and promotes positive change through the stories of our times. We produce professional area and world premieres of smart, funny, and provocative contemporary plays. We also develop the next generation of diverse artists and audiences. We are currently producing online theatre and special events through our new “Horizon at Home” program, which can be found at horizontheatre.com/horizon-at-home. For more information about Horizon Theatre Company, call 404.584.7450, email boxoffice@horizontheatre.com, or visit horizontheatre.com.

Major funding is provided bythe City of Atlanta Mayor’s Office of Cultural Affairs, the Fulton County Board of Commissioners and Fulton County Arts and Culture, the Metropolitan Atlanta Arts Fund, The Shubert Foundation, The Community Foundation of Greater Atlanta, and Bloomberg Philanthropies. Horizon is also supported in part by the Georgia Council for the Arts through appropriations from the Georgia General Assembly. GCA is a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Arts. We are grateful for our play and program corporate sponsors: Warner Media; Macy’s; the National Alliance of Musical Theatres; and the National New Play Network. 

# # # 

MEDIA:  Click here for images to go with this release. 

For more information and to set up interviews, please contact Elizabeth Hodges at elizabeth@horizontheatre.com.

Watch some of your favorite Horizon artists celebrate our planet and its future!
Experience a dozen short plays and scenes from local and national writers whose stories and styles are as diverse as their settings.

From RuPaul’s fracking ranch in Wyoming to a dreamworld of talking trees,
go on a series of adventures with over 20 characters straight from your computer.
This show was recorded with a live Zoom audience on May 13, 2021 at 8pm.

You’re sure to leave this virtual live performance full of theatrical Love for our Earth!

Thank you to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution for your coverage of the Horizon Theatre Company Young Playwrights Festival held virtually the week of May 26, 2021.

We are proud of these college-aged students who participated in an intensive week-long training workshop for some of the country’s most promising playwrights and storytellers. The workshop culminated in professional actors performing the short plays, with each show streamed online by Horizon. We’re especially proud of Chayton Pabich Danyla, Yazmeen Mayes, and Kalani Washington for being the faces of this great article!