UNDERSIEGE to Present Black Women Voices at Detroit Public Theatre

Casting is announced for the one-night only reading of Undersiege, a monumental collective work centering the voices and experiences of Black women and femmes, on Friday, October 2, 2026. The evening, presented by Detroit Public Theatre, The Obsidian Theatre Festival and The Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History is October's Fall of Freedom activation in Detroit. The Detroit presentation and partnership joins staged readings at participating theatres across the country. Fall of Freedom is a nationwide movement bringing artists, cultural institutions, and communities together through acts of creative expression.

The one-night only event will take place at Detroit Public Theatre on Friday, October 2, 2026 at 7pm EST. The performance is Free with RSVP. Detroit Public Theatre is located at 3960 3rd Avenue.

Visit www.detroitpublictheatre.org to RSVP for the evening or RSVP using this link: https://bit.ly/fof-detroit-rsvp-oct26. The event is free, and each RSVP is valid for one person only.

Curated by two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage and Tony Award-nominated playwright, MacArthur Fellow and Detroit Public Theatre Executive Artistic Producer, Dominique Morisseau, Undersiege was conceived in response to the continued silencing, displacement, and forced departure of Black women and femme leaders across American institutions in partnership with Dr. Barbara Ann Teer's National Black Theatre (NBT). NBT has led the activation of national readings.

Casaundra Freeman will direct. The company includes Jessica Care Moore (Detroit Poet Laureate), Carollette Phillips (TV: Detroiters, Diarra from Detroit), Whitney Johnson (Confederates at Detroit Public Theatre), Kelli Crump (Clyde's at Detroit Public Theatre), Bréon LaDawn, and Sydni Janeé Jackson.

Casaundra Freeman (Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Pass Over, The Mountaintop) directs. The company includes Jessica Care Moore (Detroit Poet Laureate; Salt City), Carollette Phillips (TV: Detroiters, Diarra from Detroit), Whitney Johnson (Confederates at Detroit Public Theatre), Kelli Crump (Clyde's at Detroit Public Theatre), Bréon LaDawn (Eclipsed; GhostLight Creative Productions), and Sydni Janeé Jackson (Cadillac Crew).

The project emerged from a conversation between Nottage and Morisseau following the resignation of Hana Sharif from Arena Stage and amid a broader erosion of Black femme leadership across sectors. From the dismissal of Black women working in the federal government to the silencing and forced resignations of university presidents, politicians, civil servants, educators and artistic directors, the playwrights felt compelled to respond through a collective act of creative resistance.

After reaching out to more than 30 Black women and femme playwrights, many among the most widely produced and celebrated dramatists in the country, Nottage and Morisseau found that the urgency and concern behind the project were deeply shared. Undersiege brings those voices together in a collaborative work that speaks to the complexity, strength and humanity of Black women and femmes while challenging the forces seeking to diminish or erase them.

With National Black Theatre leading the national activation, and support from Nottage and Morisseau, Undersiege will launch at the Studio Museum in Harlem and continue with presentations by 13 participating cultural institutions across the country. Each organization will bring the work into its community, creating a growing national chorus against the erasure of Black women and femmes.