Harlem Shakespeare Festival & The National Arts Club Present World Premiere of BECOMING OTHELLO: A Black Girl's Journey

The Harlem Shakespeare Festival in partnership with The National Arts Club has announced the World Premiere of BECOMING OTHELLO: A Black Girl's Journey, a solo, multimedia theatrical performance recorded live at The Center at West Park and streamed on Zoom, Monday, December 14th at 7:00pm. This filmed theatrical performance is created and performed by Debra Ann Byrd, the internationally recognized Artistic Director of Harlem Shakespeare Festival and directed by Tina Packer, the acclaimed Shakespearean and Founding Artistic Director of Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, MA. Smart, thoughtful and transformative, BECOMING OTHELLO: A Black Girl's Journey is a living memoir of Byrd's trials and triumphs with race and the opportunity to perform classical work. There will be a post-performance conversation about the show and the issues of love, loss, race, gender and equity. BECOMING OTHELLO commemorates the 8th Anniversary of The Harlem Shakespeare Festival.

Described as a living memoir, BECOMING OTHELLO: A Black Girl's Journey is a multimedia theatrical production with lyrical language, soulful songs and the music that shaped the life of a resilient little girl growing up in Spanish Harlem. This choreo-poem chronicles the life of classical actress, Debra Ann Byrd. The solo show flows from Debra Ann's recounting of her ancestral lineage to her arrival at a crossroad in life, while taking us through her joy-filled and tumultuous youth; a fateful encounter with a company of Shakespearean actors and her remarkable, gender-flipped journey on the road to becoming Othello. We share in Debra Ann's struggle with self-esteem and how, against all odds, she manages to make it through foster care, teenage pregnancy and single parenting, to become the person she always dreamed she could be. It is a deeply personal, poignant and powerful story of perseverance, tragedy, triumph and ultimately, unconditional love.

BECOMING OTHELLO: A BLACK GIRL'S JOURNEY

DATE: Monday, December 14, 2020 @ 7:00pm

LOCATION: Zoom from the National Arts Club; Registration is required.

PRICE: Eventbrite.com

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