Pride Month Calendar

UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED,

ALL EVENTS TAKE PLACE AT
RITES AND REASON THEATRE
CHURCHILL HOUSE
155 ANGELL STREET PROVIDENCE

More Than Marriage:

Building an Inclusive Queer Movement

for more info BLACKLAV.COM OR

BLACKLAVENDER@BROWN.EDU
THURSDAY APRIL 2

SATURDAY APRIL 11

Staceyann Chin
2009 Pride Month & Kick-Off
Event: Reception to follow at
Rites and Reason Theatre
7PM, Salomon 101

Agenda Release Party: Spring

2009 issue launch concert with
queer recording artists: Rap
duo SGT SASS, Adam Joseph
(as seen onLOGO), and The
Citys Fiercest drag queen
Peppermint (The Real World:
Brooklyn)
10PM, Wriston Quad

MONDAY APRIL 6
The Politics of Dont Ask,
Dont Tell
6PM, location TBA
TUESDAY APRIL 7
Is Gay the New Black?
Lecture & Discussion with
Reverend Irene Monroe
7PM, Smith Buonanno 106
WEDNESDAY APRIL 8
Red Without Blue
Film screening/discussion
with Filmmaker Brooke Sebold
7PM, List 120
THURSDAY APRIL 9
Free, Anonymous HIV Testing
1-6PM, Leung Gallery
Out in the Workplace:
Employer Panel with Top Firms
in Finance and Consulting
4:30-6PM, Smith Buonanno 106
Pan Asian Queers:
a discussion regarding the
unique intersection of being
Asian & LGBTQ
8-10PM, Third World Center 308
FRIDAY APRIL 10TH
Why Bisexuals Have Worse
Health than Gays and Lesbians
and What We Can Do about
All Health Disparities: Out for
Lunch and Presentation with
Amy Andr, MA
12-1PM, Petteruti Lounge,
Faunce House

Safer Sex Dance

10PM, Grad Center Lounge
MONDAY APRIL 13
Film Screening:
The Raspberry Reich by
Bruce LaBruce - Lecture by
Genie Brinkema to follow on
7PM, Salomon 001
TUESDAY APRIL 14
Rainbow Day Extravaganza:
Make a tie-dye shirt!
All day throughout campus
Pride Month Keynote: 5th
Anniversary of the LGBTQ
Resource Center - After Prop
8: The War over the Future of
State Sponsored Love Lecture
& Discussion with Dr. Lisa
Duggan, NYU
7-9PM, Salomon 001
WEDNESDAY APRIL 15
Lecture by Genie Brinkema:
The Revolution Is My
Boyfriend: the Queercore
Terror-Porn of Bruce LaBruce
7PM, Salomon 001
THURSDAY APRIL 16
The Cultural Phenomenon
of Hip Hop: Misogyny and
Homophobia in Entertainment
and Its Effect on Society in
the 21st Century Lecture by
Terrence Dean
7-9PM, List 120
FRIDAY APRIL 17
Day of Silence
Pledge cards in the LGBTQ
Resource Center, Faunce 321

MONDAY APRIL 20
Film Viewing Party:
Jumping the Broom
8-10PM, LGBTQ Resource
Center

7PM

WEDNESDAY APRIL 22
Undergrad/Grad Student Social
All welcome, 21+ to drink
10-12PM, Grad Student Lounge

8:30PM

Staceyann Chin (Def Poetry Jam)

Pride Month Convocation
Salomon 101
DECOMPRESSION GATHERING
Food, music, and reflections

THURSDAY APRIL 23
The Tranny Roadshow;
including poets, rappers,
filmmakers, storytellers,
breakdancers, rock bands,
comedians, actors, folk singers,
photographers and zinesters
7pm-9pm, List 120
FRIDAY APRIL 24

4PM

Production, Performance, Product

The politics of writing and performing Blackness/Queerness
with Staceyann Chin, Andre Lancaster (Freedom Train Productions)
and Ernest Hardy (The LA Times/Redbone Press)

7PM

Civil Sex by Brian Freeman

Dramatic Reading Directed by Benny Sato Ambush
A story about Civil Rights organizer and MLK confidant Bayard
Rustin and the turbulent times in which he lived
FolkThought facilitated by Connie Crawford

10AM

Discussion with BLX Playwrights

with Brian Freeman (Civil Sex), Sharon Bridgforth (Con Flama)
and Daniel Alexander Jones (The Book of Daniel Project)

Out for Lunch with Providence

Mayor David N. Cicilline83:
A conversation with the first
openly gay mayor of a state
capital
12pm-1pm, Leung Gallery
SATURDAY APRIL 25
Brown/RISD Drag Show
7PM RISD Auditorium
MONDAY APRIL 27
Marriage vs. Civil Unions
for Same-Sex Couples:
Why Nominal Inequality is
Unconstitutional
Janus Conversation with
Professor Courtney Cahill
7pm, Kassar Foxboro
Auditorium

1:30PM

THURSDAY APRIL 30
The Making of a Graphic Novel
Lecture and discussion with
author Ali Liebegott
7PM, RISD Tap Room

6PM

FRIDAY MAY 1
Looking back, looking forward.
Reception to follow.
4-6PM, Salomon 001

10PM

con flama by Sharon Bridgforth

Dramatic Reading Directed by Robbie McCauley
A Black gurls personal history and connection with the
people in her world/community
FolkThought facilitated by Kym Moore
Selections from The Book of Daniel Project
by Daniel Alexander Jones
Performance Directed by Daniel Alexander Jones
A tactile experience that opens the way for
complexity and contradiction
FolkThought facilitated by John Emigh
Closing Party at
The Providence Black Repertory Company
276 Westminster Street

Welcome!
LGBTQ Pride Month is celebrated each April at Brown University.
We hold Pride Month in April at Brown so that we learn about and
celebrate the lives of LGBTQ people while school is in session.
The theme for 2009 is More Than Marriage: Building an Inclusive
Queer Movement. Throughout the month there are lectures,
performances, social and educational programs that highlight the
rich culture and diversity that exists within LGBTQ communities.
Kicking off 2009 Pride Month is a performance by Staceyann Chin
and The Black Lavender Experience - theatre and conversations
sparked by queer playwrights. The idea for The Black Lavender
Experience (BLX) came from a course, Black Lavender: A Study
of Plays with Black LGBTQ content that Professor Elmo TerryMorgan created and taught. Offered by the Department of
Africana Studies at Brown, the course began in 1998. The LGBTQ
Resource Center and Rites and Reason Theatre have partnered to
celebrate Browns Pride Month and to share the groundbreaking
work from the course with wider audiences.
Production opportunities are sparse for most Black playwrights,
but for Black Queers they are almost nonexistent. In order for
these Black Lavender voices to be heard in wider communities
they must be provided a stage. Being able to offer a platform for
extraordinary talents such as playwrights Brian Freeman, Sharon
Bridgforth, directors Benny Sato Ambush, Robbie McCauley
and playwright/director Daniel Alexander Jones is an honor for
Rites and Reason and an unparalleled opportunity for Brown and
Rhode Island.
This month we also celebrate the 5th Anniversary of the
Brown LGBTQ Resource Center! We hope youll join us in this
celebration. The Pride Month calendar is in the program.

Karen Allen Baxter, Producer/Managing Director

Africana Studies/Rites and Reason

The other day, I Wikipedia-ed the word lavender. And this is what I found out:
Because the cultivated forms of the plant are nurtured in gardens world-wide, it
can often be encountered growing wild, as garden escapees, well beyond its
natural range. I did find out, however, that because lavender cross-polinates
easily, there are countless variations among the species.
Growing wild; cross-polinating easily; countless variations among the species.
Does that sound familiar? It would have to, at least, I think, to anyone associated
with, affected by, or invested in the increasingly visible manifestations of culture
that represent the LGBTQ community(s). And when youre talking about the
community(s) of color that sparkle throughout the vibrant fabric of LGBTQ work
and art and politics, youre really talking some variations and cross-polinating. Youre talking about the messy yet beautiful glow of humanity, the wild
style of multiple voices singing praises and shouting anger and showing love.
We convene this week to engage some of these voices, to join in a declaration, a
conversation, an Experience, unlike any other. It is thrilling, indeed, because this
is the first one, the start of something that will sprout forms, cultivated and un-,
wild and free, questioning yet determined to provoke, enlighten, entertain.
This is a convocation.

We are calling this convocation The Black Lavender Experience: Theater and
Conversation Sparked by the Work of Queer Playwrights. Not just because
we want to be, need to be, different, but because we want to be, need to be,
fierceand I dont mean fierce in that tired, finger-snapping (s)language of
trendiness. I mean the kind of fierece-ness that results from hard work, real talk,
and planting seeds that grow the kind of wildness that keeps conversations going. Im talking the fierce-ness of performance, of raising the curtain on voices
and faces and gestures which constitute community(s) that are demanding to be
heard in the garden we call the world.

Kelly Garrett, Coordinator

LGBTQ Resource Center

Elmo Terry-Morgan, Professor/Artistic Director

Africana Studies/Rites and Reason

Tend to your part of the garden.

So join us. Experience. Converse. Nurture.

Grow.

THURSDAY APRIL 2

FRIDAY APRIL 3

Staceyann Chin (Def Poetry Jam)

Civil Sex by Brian Freeman

A story about Civil Rights organizer and MLK confidant Bayard Rustin

7PM Pride Month Convocation

and the turbulent times in which he lived.

Salomon Center, The Main Green

7PM Dramatic Reading Directed by Benny Sato Ambush
8:30PM Decompression Gathering: Food, music, and reflections.

FolkThought facilitated by Connie Crawford

Churchill House, 155 Angell Street, Providence RI

Mosaic, Curve, Venus, The New York

Brian Freeman is an award-winning

cast list
Mark Brown

Foundation for the Arts (NYFAs) FYI,

playwright, director, and performer. His

and Jane, as well as the newspapers,

play Civil Sex, about the black gay civil

the New York Newsday, The Village

rights activist Bayard Rustin, has been

Voice, and Drum Voices have featured

produced by Berkeley Repertory The-

Staceyann. The myriad of journals

atre, the Joseph Papp Public Theater,

and newsletters in which her work has

NYC and Woolly Mammoth Theater,

appeared also include, the New York

Washington, D.C. He has written or co-

Times Magazine, The Shades Newslet-

authored more than two dozen plays,

ter, GMAD magazine, the New York

solo shows and performance works,

Blade, The Monsoon, and the Black

including Fierce Love and Dark Fruit

womens magazine, Personal Person-

for Pomo Afro Homos, the ground-

Staceyann Chin is a fulltime artist. A

als. Her individual performances war-

breaking black queer performance trio.

resident of New York City and a Ja-

ranted her work being published in

He has directed and developed solo

maican National, she has been an

the New York Times, the Washington

shows by Paul Flores, Regie Cabico,

out poet and political activist since

Post, and the Pittsburgh Daily. Her

Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Wayne Corbett,

1998. From the rousing cheers of the

work was also featured on 60 Min-

Diane Ferlatte, Jerry Quickley, Marijo,

Nuyorican Poets Cafe to one-woman

utes. The Other Side of Paradise, Ms.

and Robert Karimi; experimental works

shows Off- Broadway to poetry work-

Chins memoir, will be released April

with Bill T. Jones, Rhodessa Jones and

shops in Denmark and London to co-

14 on Simon and Schuster.

Marc Bamuthi Joseph; and plays with

writer and performer in the Tony nom-

the Mark Taper Forum, Public The-

inated, Russell Simmons Def Poetry

ater, the Theater Offensive, Teatro Vi-

Jam on Broadway, Chin credits the

sion, and San Francisco Mime Troupe.

long list of things she has done to

Awards include a California Arts Coun-

her grandmothers hard-working history and the pain of her mothers absence. Various American publications,
including the magazines A, Everybody,

BLX DECOMPRESSION
PROCESSING OUR THOUGHTS
AND IDEAS COLLECTIVELY
FEATURING STUDENT SPEAKERS
AND LIVE MUSIC
IMMEDIATELY AFTER STACEYANN CHIN
AT RITES & REASON TREATRE
FREE FOOD FROM BLAZE

cil Playwriting Fellowship, a Creative

Capital fellowship, the New York Dance
& Performance Bessie and the CalArts Alpert Award in Theatre.

Ora Star Boncore

Kibwe Chase-Marshall
Lizzy Gore
Jamie Harris
Michael Reiss
Dan Ricker
Anthony Urena
Teng Yang

SATURDAY APRIL 4

SATURDAY APRIL 4

con flama by Sharon Bridgforth

A Black gurls personal history and connection with the people

Selections from The Book of Daniel Project

by Daniel Alexander Jones

in her world/community

A tactile experience that opens the way for complexity and contradiction

1:30PM Dramatic Reading Directed by Robbie McCauley

6PM Performance Directed by Daniel Alexander Jones

FolkThought facilitated by Kym Moore

FolkThought facilitated by John Emigh

Sharon Bridgforth, two time Alpert

Daniel Alexander Jones is a theatrical

AN INTEGRATORS MANUAL

Award Nominee, is recipient of the

integrator. His live art fuses writing, per-

(Selections from the

2008

Residency

formance, design, direction through dy-

Book of Daniel Project)

Prize. Her piece, delta dandi, is a NPN

namic collaboration. His theater pieces

by Daniel Alexander Jones

Creation

co-commis-

include The Book of Daniel, Bel Canto,

with additional text by Robbie

sioned by Women & Their Work in

Earthbirths, Blood:Shock:Boogie and

McCauley, Erik Ehn

partnership with The Center on Hal-

Cab and Lena. Daniels theater work

and music by Walter Kitundu

sted and the National Performance

has met with audience and critical ac-

Network. Bridgforth is the Lambda

claim for more than fifteen years.

Alpert/Hedgebrook
Fund

Project

Award winning author of the bull-jean

stories and love conjure/blues a performance/novel (RedBone Press). Anchor Artist for The Austin Project (Produced by The Center For African and
African American Studies, UT Austin),
Bridgforth is co-editor of The Austin
Project Archive: Experiments in a Jazz

Daniel is a resident playwright at New

cast list
Gabriel Doss
Lauren Neal
Raffini
Shaunne Thomas

Dramatists in NYC, is a national company member with Pillsbury House

Theatre in Minneapolis, was a core
company member of Frontera@Hyde
Park Theatre in Austin, TX and with
Penumbra Theatre Company in St.

Aesthetic (2010 by University of Texas

Paul. Daniel is an Assistant Professor

Press). Sharon wrote con flama as a

in the Department of Theatre and Vi-

1999-2000 National Endowment for the

sual Art at Fordham University. Daniel

Arts/Theatre Communications Group

is a 1993 graduate of Brown and now

Artist in Residence at Frontera, Hyde

resides in Manhattan.

Park Theatre, Austin, TX. Keep in touch

with her at sharonbridgforth.com

cast list
Fedna Jacquet
Jonathan Dent
Himmat Randhawa
Eunice Png
Shaunne N. Thomas

The Book of Daniel Project has been

developed with support from Tea
Alagic, Naomi Iizuka and UCSB,
ALLGO, Goddard College, The John
Warfield Center for African and
African American Studies at UT
Austin and the Department of Theatre
and Dance at UT Austin.

Benny Sato Ambush is Distinguished Producing Director-in-Residence at Emerson Stage, the

producing wing of the Department of Performing Arts, Emerson College, Boston. In addition
to his career as a professional stage director,
Mr. Ambush is also as producer, educator and
consultant. A 1973 graduate of Brown, Ambush
was a founding member of the Rites and Reason Theatre Company and worked as Acting Artistic Director from 1977-78. He has directed at
numerous professional regional theatres nationwide. Mr. Ambush has held teaching positions at
Universities across the country, including Brown.
Although his career has been multidisciplinary
and varied, writes Chris McCoy of Emerson
Stage, one common thread has been his devotion to telling stories. His advice to theatre students is that it is very important work that they
do, telling stories that till the soil of humanity.
Kym Moore is a director, a published playwright, a producer and pursues screenwriting,
as well as conducts experiments in multimedia
production. She is The Gerard Visiting Assistant Professor of Theatre, Speech and Dance
at Brown University where she teaches acting
and directing. At Brown, she is currently directing The Other Shore by Gao Xingjian, and last
fall directed Funnyhouse of a Negro by Adrienne
Kennedy. Kyms Off-Broadway and Regional directing credits include for colored girls that have
considered suicide when the rainbow is enuf at
Penumbra Theatre; Khmer Amerika at HereArts
Center; Black, Outside, and The Date at The
Womens Project; Muses at The Boston Center
for the Arts; Cover (Semi-Finalist) Samuel French
Festival; Adventures of a Black Girl in Search of
God at The Workshop Theatre; and Le Hot Blu:
An American Syncopated Musical (Assoc. Dir)
at Manhattan Theatre Club. She is a graduate of
the M.F.A. Directing program at the University of
Massachusetts-Amherst.
Robbie McCauleys impressive professional career has seen her in a multitude of artistic roles,
including teacher, actor, writer, director, and performance artist. Renowned for her expertise in
experimental and avant-garde theatre, Robbie
has been honored with Audelco, Bessie, and

OBIE awards, and brings a dazzling artistic resume and an unequivocal passion for the arts to
her post at Emerson College, where she is currently Professor of Performing Arts. Much of her
work to date has dealt with social changethe
idea that the power of art can be used to build a
common language for a diverse audience.
John Emigh is a professor in the Theatre,
Speech, and Dance Department at Brown University, where he has been teaching and directing since 1967. He has directed more than
70 plays in universities and in the professional
theatre and he initiated Browns New Plays
series. In 1974-75, he traveled in New Guinea,
South Asia, and Indonesia, where he studied
Balinese topeng masked dance with I Nyoman
Kakul, and he has since adapted this form for
one-man shows performed throughout the
United States and Asia. He has made several other research trips to Asia, investigating,
writing about, and making films on the street
jesters and court fools of Rajasthan, the Prahlada Nataka of Eastern India, and the changing
dynamics of performance in Bali. He is the author of Masked Performance: The Play of Self
and Other in Ritual and Theatre (University of
Pennsylvania Press, 1996) and more recently
has written about contemporary Asian and
Western performances, Mexican and European mask traditions, and the relationship
of Performance Studies to recent findings of
Cognitive Neuroscience. He was co-ordinator
of the Rhode Island New Theatre Festival of
1971, was the founding chairperson of the
Association for Asian Performance, helped to
found Browns Dept. of Theatre, Speech and
Dance and chaired that Department from 1987
to 1993, and in 2005 directed Performance
Studies internationals conference and festival:
Becoming Uncomfortable.
Connie Crawford teaches acting and directing in the Department of Theatre, Speech and
Dance at Brown University. She is the Marsha
Z. West Director-in-Residence for Rites and
Reason Theatre. Connie is a resident instructor and director at Perishable Theatre. Connie
graduated from Vassar College and from The
Juilliard Schools Drama Division. She has per-

formed on and off Broadway, on daytime TV,

on Saturday Night Live and in independent
films. As a member of the Acting Company,
she toured the United States for two years.
Connie is also an animal activist and has
worked with horses and actors to heighten
physical awareness and deepen communication between the horse and the human.
Ernest Hardy is an author, artist, and film
critic. His work has appeared in LA Weekly,
LA Times, NY Times, Vibe, Rolling Stone, Millennium Film Journal, Flaunt, and more. He
contributed to the reference books 1,001
Movies You Must See Before You Die and
Classic Material: The Hip-Hop Album Guide.
A Sundance Fellow, Hardy has sat as a juror
for the Sundance Film Festival, San Francisco
International Film Festival, Palm Springs International Short Film Festival and Los Angeles
Outfest, and co-programmed the FUSION
Film Festival in LA. Blood Beats Vol. 1, his
collection of criticism (interviews / reviews /
essays), was published by Red Bone Press
in April 2006; it won the PEN/Beyond Margins award in 2007. Blood Beats Vol. 2 was
published February 2008. Hardy has lectured
or appeared on panels at Princeton, Columbia,
DePaul, USC and more.
Andre Lancaster is a playwright, stage director, and Artistic & Managing Director of
Freedom Train Productions. His playwriting
has been developed and staged at HERE Arts
Center, BRIC Studio, Freedom Train Productions, Esperanza Peace and Justice Center,
Hyde Park Theatre, and New Works Festival
at the University of Texas at Austin. In 2006,
his direction of Andrea E. Daviss A Love Like
Damiens was staged at WOW Cafe Theatre
and HERE Arts Center. In just over two years,
Freedom Train Productions has produced
two festivals featuring eight new works of
political theatre and has received foundation
support from Union Square Arts Awards and
Brooklyn Arts Council. Past honors include:
HERE Arts Center Supported Artist Award,
Our Word Playwright (Columbia University,
Writing Division), and NYU Wagners Social
Justice Fellowship.

Benny Sato Ambush

Robbie McCauleys

Connie Crawford

Ernest Hardy

crew/stage management

The
Black
Lavender
Experience
Team
Karen Allen Baxter
Managing Director, Rites and Reason Theatre
Lisa Batt-Parente
Costume Designer, Rites and Reason Theatre
Stephen Chaisson 10
Pride Month Coordinator

BROWN
UNIVERSITY
rites & reason THEATRE/
Africana
studies
FACULTY

Kelly Garrett
LGBTQ Resource Center Coordinator

B. Anthony Bogues

Ashley Harris 09
Production Manager, Rites and Reason Theatre

Lundy Braun

Alonzo Jones
Technical and Set Lighting Director,
Rites and Reason Theatre

Brenda Allen
Dorothy Denniston
Anani Dzidzienyo
Francoise Hamlin

Alicia Maule 11
Decompression Coordinator

Paget Henry

Liz Morgan 10
Assistant Director and Stage Manager of Civil
Sex for Benny Sato Ambush

Keisha-Khan Y. Perry

Alex Morse 11
Pride Month Coordinator
Sam Porter 08.5
Black Lavender Experience Intern,
Playbill Coordinator
Scott Poulson-Bryant 08
Adjunct Professor, Africana Studies
Sevita Qarshi 10
Assistant Director and Stage Manager of con
flama for Robbie McCauley
Micah Salkind MA 10
Assistant to the Managing Director,
Rites and Reason Theatre
Roseanne Fleming, 12
TITLE?????
Elmo Terry-Morgan 74
Director, Artistic Director for Rites and Reason
Theatre, Associate Professor Africana Studies
and Theatre, Speech & Dance

Nancy Jacobs
Tricia Rose
Ruth J. Simmons
Elmo Terry-Morgan
Corey D.B. Walker
John Edgar Wideman
Ama Ata Aidoo
George Lamming
Kerry Stuart Coppin
Olakunle George
Glenn C. Loury
Rolland Murray
Charles E. Cobb Jr.
Clarice LaVerne Thompson
Nathalie Etoke
Donald W. King
STAFF
Karen Allen Baxter

Shaunne N. Thomas
Assistant Director, Rites and Reason Theatre

Donna Edmonds Mitchell

Clarice LaVerne Thompson, DA

Music Director, Rites and Reason Theatre, and
Adjunct Professor Africana Studies

Alonzo T. Jones

Jason Tranchida/LLAMAproduct
Black Lavender Experience Graphic Designer

Dawn M. Jackson

Thank Yous

AVAILABLE
PAGE

Equity Action, a fund of

The Rhode Island Foundation