Roger Guenveur Smith Returns to the Stage Virtually With OTTO FRANK

Back by popular demand, Obie award-winning actor and writer Roger Guenveur Smith (Do The Right Thing) returns to the stage-- virtually -- with his new solo performance, Otto Frank, a historical account of the father of Anne Frank. The performance is in collaboration with The Theatre School at DePaul University and made possible by DePaul Center for Black Diaspora & Jewish Life. The virtual event will take place via Zoom on Monday, September 21, 2020 at 7:00pm CST, with a live post-show discussion to follow.

Tickets are available for free here.

The performance marks Smith's return engagement on what had been planned as an international theatrical tour before the COVID-19 pandemic. The virtual event is the first of many soon-to-be-announced engagements of the reimagined tour.

"Rodney King introduced me to Otto Frank. I was invited to perform Rodney King in Amsterdam and it was there that I was able to visit the Anne Frank House. I imagined her father there, after the war, having lost his wife and their two daughters. In silence. And resolve. As my anonymous narrator had pursued an impossible conversation with Rodney King, my Otto Frank, the custodian of his daughter's legacy, speaks to her from far beyond her time and his own, interrogating the crisis of our present moment from a not-so-distant past," says Roger Guenveur Smith. "I'm excited to perform Otto Frank virtually as it allows us to reach a wider audience and safely. I'm grateful for the support from DePaul Center for Black Diaspora & Jewish Life and to be working with DePaul University."

Otto Frank is a new solo performance created and performed by Roger Guenveur Smith, with sound design by Marc Anthony Thompson. The Obie Award-winning collaborators have been inspired by the father of diarist Anne Frank, the only member of his immediate family to survive the Holocaust. Smith's narrative is an intimate meditation on loss, complicated by Frank's simultaneous service to both the living and the dead. Smith's Otto Frank is reminiscent of his previous performances including Netflix's RODNEY KING and the Obie Award-winning A HUEY P. NEWTON STORY.

Smith's has previously read and performed Otto Frank at several venues across the country, including: Portland Center Stage, the Willamette Writers' Conference, Seattle Theater Group, the Redfern Arts Center, the Holocaust and Human Rights Center of Maine, the College of the Holy Cross.

Roger Guenver Smith is represented by Steven Adams of Alta Global Media.

ABOUT Roger Guenveur Smith

Smith is known for starring in an unprecedented 13 films with Academy Award-winning director Spike Lee, more than any other actor in the American cinema. Collaborations with Lee include, DO THE RIGHT THING, MALCOLM X, HE GOT GAME, the Peabody Award winning A HUEY P NEWTON STORY and CHIRAQ, among others. Smith has also brought important historical figures to cinematic turns in AMERICAN GANGSTER, Frederick Douglass NOW, WHO KILLED Bob Marley?, IN HONOR OF JEAN-MICHEL BASQUIAT, INSIDE THE CREOLE MAFIA with Mark Broyard, MARSHALL, as NAACP Secretary Walter White, BETTER MUS' COME as Jamaican Prime Minister Michael Manley, and BEHIND THE MOVEMENT as Rosa Parks' husband and comrade Raymond Parks. He also stars as the supporting lead role in Rick Famuyiwa's comedy DOPE.

On the television front, Smith is also part of the cast of Bounce TV's top rated series SAINTS AND SINNERS opposite Vanessa Bell Calloway and recently starred inThe NAACP Image Award nominated BEHIND THE MOVEMENT opposite Meta Goldingrecently and QUEEN SUGAR opposite Michael Michelle, in an episode directed by Leisl Tommy and the role of Booker T. Washington opposite the Oscar-winning Octavia Butler's Madame CJ Walker in the upcoming Netflix series SELF MADE.

Smith has also essayed studies of iconoclast artists Jean-Michel Basquiat, Simon Rodia, and Charles White, baseball greats Juan Marichal and John Roseboro, and musical legend Jimi Hendrix.

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