Director Jon Royal Selected As The SDCF 2023 Lloyd Richards New Futures Resident Artist At St. Louis Black Repertory Theatre

Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation (SDCF) announces that Jon Royal, a director, teaching artist, and facilitator from Nashville, TN, has been selected as the 2023 Lloyd Richards New Futures Resident Artist at St. Louis Black Repertory Theatre, where he will work with Founder and Producing Director Ron Himes.

Named for the legendary leader of the American theatre, the Lloyd Richard New Futures Residency supports mid-career BIPOC directors or choreographers who are interested in artistic leadership through a year-long residency at a regional theatre led by a forward-thinking artistic director. A meaningful role at the theatre and the opportunity to direct or choreograph a production within three years following the residency's conclusion are guaranteed.

The program provides extraordinary access while positioning artists of color for advanced opportunities to lead. As Resident Artist, Royal will receive a $40,000 grant along with access to health insurance and additional assistance with housing and travel.

Jon Royal is a freelance director, teaching artist, and facilitator from Nashville, TN. Said Royal in his Resident Artist application, “I want to create a space where artists can have a place to exist as their full selves. I want to build an institution that's based on telling stories from the myriad of Black perspectives. I want to create an organization in which everyone's values align, including board, staff, contractors, and community. I feel this residency will help equip me with more tools to aid in growing and leading spaces like the one I envision.”

Said Justin Emeka, Co-Chair of the Lloyd Richards New Futures Residency Selection Committee, “We are thrilled to support the artistry and vision of Jon Royal with this residency. We look forward to him building an impactful relationship with the extraordinary St Louis Black Rep.”

The SDCF committee included Justin Emeka and Anne Kauffman as co-chairs, Lydia Fort, Kent Gash, Chay Yew, and advisor Scott Richards.

The 2023 Lloyd Richards New Futures Residency is made possible with support from The Diana King Memorial Fund presented by The Charles and Lucille King Family Foundation, the Miranda Family Fund, Concord Theatricals, and support through the SDCF fellowship funds named for Shepard and Mildred Traube and Sir John Gielgud, and many generous individuals.

For more information about the program, please visit https://sdcfoundation.org/2023-resident-artist-and-host-theatre/.

Jon Royal is a director, teaching artist, and facilitator from Nashville, TN. He studied with Ming Cho Lee and Constance Hoffman during the Kennedy Center Approach to Design Intensive, forever changing his approach to art, work, and life. In 2016, he was a member of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation's National Observership Class, in which he had the privilege of shadowing Liesl Tommy on the Public Theater's production of Party People. He was named Best Theatre Director of 2019 by the Nashville Scene. In 2020 he received the Tennessee Arts Commission's Individual Artist Fellowship for his work in the field. This past year he directed the world premieres of The Forgotten Girl at First Stage in Milwaukee and Fences at Nashville Repertory Theatre, and he staged the world premiere of Hannibal Lokumbei's opera The Jonah People: A Legacy of Struggle and Triumph with the Nashville Symphony. Other directing credits include Pipeline, Topdog/Underdog, Smart People for Nashville Repertory Theatre, Ghost (world premiere), And In This Corner: Cassius Clay, Rosa Parks and the Montgomery Bus Boycott for Nashville Children's Theatre, Once On This Island, Hairspray, The Colored Museum, Passing Strange for Street Theatre Company, Othello for Nashville Shakespeare Festival, and Citizen: An American Lyric for Actor's Bridge Ensemble. He also works behind the camera. Recent film projects have seen him directing the concert documentary Walk Together Children: The 150th Anniversary of the Fisk Jubilee Singers, which has been distributed nationally on PBS, and producing The Creswell Story, a student-driven film project that studies the history of Nashville's Arts Middle Magnet School for the Performing Arts and its namesake. As an educator he serves on the Theatre faculty for Governor's School for the Arts of Tennessee, teaching Devising and Community Building. He also co-leads the Nashville Children's Theatre's Teaching Artists of Color training cohort, and teaches for Tennessee Performing Art Center's Disney Musicals In Schools, and Shakespeare Center Los Angeles' Write On!, Willpower to Youth, and works on their national design team to develop Shakespeare and Social Justice curriculum for high school classrooms around the country. This past fall he facilitated workshops for RACE FORWARD's most recent Government Alliance on Race and Equity cohort, helping public servants engage with artistic practice to deepen their sense of collaboration in their work.

Lloyd Richards (1919–2006) was born in Toronto and raised in Detroit. He entered Wayne University (now Wayne State) intending to become a lawyer, but due to a love of theatre, became a speech major. He joined the Army Air Corps in 1944 during World War II and earned his pilot wings at Tuskegee. After the war, he acted in two semiprofessional theatres in Detroit that he helped create, worked as a radio disc jockey, and was employed as a social worker for the Welfare Department. He moved to New York City in 1947, and worked as an actor in radio, Off-Broadway, and eventually Broadway. In 1956, his friend and former student Sidney Poitier enlisted him to direct A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry. It went on to artistic and commercial success on Broadway, and Richards became the first Black director nominated for the Tony Award for Best Direction.

He was a Founding Member of Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC) in 1959, and its President from 1970 to 1980. From 1968 until 1999, he headed the National Playwrights Conference (NPC) at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre Center, where he developed the work of John Guare, Derek Wolcott, Wole Soyinka, Israel Horovitz, Wendy Wasserstein, Christopher Durang, David Henry Hwang, John Patrick Shanley, Lee Blessing, Doug Wright, and Adam Rapp, among hundreds of others. In 1979, he was named Dean of the Yale School of Drama and the Artistic Director of Yale Repertory Theatre, where noted productions include three premieres by Athol Fugard. Richards went on to direct six new plays by Wilson while creating a vertically integrated developmental process that brought those plays from the O'Neill to Yale through a tour of regional theatres, culminating in premiere commercial productions on Broadway. This process proved so successful that during the 1987-1988 Broadway season, four plays he either directed or produced were running simultaneously. Richards won the Tony Award for Best Direction for August Wilson's Fences in 1987 and the National Medal of Arts in 1993. He died on June 29, 2006, his 87th birthday.

Founded by Producing Director Ron Himes, the vision for The Black Rep continues: a more equitable distribution of opportunities and resources for Black professionals and students in the theater; improved representation on and back-stage in the theater industry; and a fostered community culture of support and mentorship for those who will follow.

Founded in 1965, Stage Directors and Choreographers Foundation (SDCF) celebrates, develops, and supports professional stage directors and choreographers throughout every phase of their careers. We work to build a theatrical community that reflects the cultural, racial, and gender diversity of our nation by creating opportunities for artists of all backgrounds to bring their full, authentic selves to their work as creative leaders in the theatre.

SDCF is committed to fostering an environment that is inclusive and does not discriminate on the basis of ethnicity, religion, disability, age, sexual orientation, or gender identity or expression in its programs or activities. www.sdcfoundation.org.