Kerry Washington to Discuss Upcoming Memoir at The Apollo's Inaugural Festival of Arts & Ideas

The Apollo and Ta-Nehisi Coates, Apollo’s Master Artist in Residence announced today that Sage Adams, Dr. Yaba Blay, Jelani Cobb, Ghetto Gastro Collective, Michael Harriot, Jemele Hill, Marlon James,Barry Jenkins, Bomani Jones, Nikole Hannah-Jones, Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, Chelsea Miller, Terence Nance, Kamasi Washington, and Kerry Washington have been added to the lineup of  [at] The Intersection, The Apollo’s Festival of Arts & Ideas, Friday, October 6- Sunday, October 8, 2023. 
 

Curated by critically-acclaimed thinker and writer Ta-Nehisi Coates, [at] The Intersection will bring together Black artists, intellectuals, creators and cultural movers. The new creators will join previously announced participants, including Ted Bunch, Bisa Butler, Jordan E. Cooper, Stefon Harris, Michael R. Jackson, Diallo Riddle, Bashir Salahuddin, Dominique Morisseau, Stephen Satterfield, Salamishah Tillet, Scheherazade Tillet, and Liesl Tommy. 
 

The three-day event will be held at The Apollo’s Historic Theater. Festival passes are available for purchase at https://www.apollotheater.org/event/at-the-intersection-festival.
 

Sessions will include: 

• Emmy award-winning producer, actor, and author Kerry Washington in conversation with Ta-Nehisi Coates about her upcoming memoir, Thicker Than Water. For more information on Kerry and Thicker Than Water, visit www.KerryWashingtonBook.com.
• Sports journalists’ Jemele Hill and Bomani Jones as they discuss the prominence of Black athletes in 21st Century sports entertainment.
• A panel discussion about the historical context of erasure in the age of woke culture with Dr. Yaba Blay, Michael Harriot, Nikole Hannah-Jones, Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, and more panelists to be announced.
• Theater creatives’ Jordan E. Cooper, Michael R. Jackson, Dominique Morisseau, and Lisel Tommy panel discussion about telling new stories on Broadway.
• Breaking Bread, a panel exploring Black food as culinary delight, cultural memory and communal empowerment with food writer and producer, Stephen Satterfield and Bronx-based collective, Ghetto Gastro. 

The festival will also include:

• Music Performances: Curated performances from emerging and legendary music artists.  
• Between the Talks: Unique opportunities for festival attendees to network and engage with each other.

For more information and updates, please visit the event  https://www.apollotheater.org/event/at-the-intersection-festival/. Join the A-List here, follow The Apollo on social media at @apollotheater, and join the conversation using hashtag #AtTheIntersection.

Tickets

[at] The Intersection tickets and festival passes are available for purchase at https://www.apollotheater.org/event/at-the-intersection-festival/. 

VIP Festival Passes begin at $250 offering premium entrance, preferred seating, discounts on food and beverages, and admission to all daytime panel discussions, lectures, performances, and workshops on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. General Admission Full Festival Passes begin at $180. Single day tickets and discounts to Harlem residents, students, business owners and employees are also available.

About Ta-Nehisi Coates

Ta-Nehisi Coates is a writer, currently holding  the Sterling Brown Chair in the Department of English at Howard University. He is the author of the bestselling books The Beautiful Struggle, We Were Eight Years in Power, The Water Dancer, and Between the World and Me. He is a recipient of a National Magazine Award, a National Book Award and a MacArthur Fellowship.
 

About The Apollo’s Master-Artist-in-Residence Program 
Apollo’s Master-Artist-in-Residence program is a three-year initiative that deepens the Apollo’s relationship with a prominent, influential artist whose work aligns with the Apollo’s mission as a beacon of Black culture and catalyst for artistic production for the Harlem community and around the world. 
 

About The Apollo

The legendary Apollo—the soul of American culture—plays a vital role in cultivating emerging artists and launching legends. Since its founding, The Apollo has served as a center of innovation and a creative catalyst for Harlem, the city of New York, and the world. In 2024, The Apollo will open The Apollo’s Victoria Theaters, which will include two new theater spaces, and begin the renovation of its Historic Theater, marking the first ever expansion and renovation of The Apollo in its nearly 90-year history. Read more about the project here: www.apollotheater.org/renovation-restoration-and-transformation/ 

With music at its core, The Apollo’s programming extends to dance, theater, spoken word, and more. This includes the world premiere of the theatrical adaptation of Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me and the New York premiere of the opera We Shall Not Be Moved; special programs such as the blockbuster concert Bruno Mars Live at the Apollo; 100: The Apollo Celebrates Ella; and the annual Africa Now! Festival. The non-profit Apollo is a performing arts presenter, commissioner, and collaborator that also produces festivals, large-scale dance and musical works organized around a set of core initiatives that celebrate and extend The Apollo’s legacy through a contemporary lens, including the Women of the World (WOW) Festival as well as other multidisciplinary collaborations with partner organizations. 

 
Since introducing the first Amateur Night contests in 1934, The Apollo has served as a testing ground for new artists working across a variety of art forms and has ushered in the emergence of many new musical genres—including jazz, swing, bebop, R&B, gospel, blues, soul, and hip-hop. Among the countless legendary performers who launched their careers at The Apollo are Ella Fitzgerald, Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Gladys Knight, Luther Vandross, H.E.R. D’Angelo, Lauryn Hill, Jazmine Sullivan, Machine Gun Kelly, and Miri Ben Ari; and The Apollo’s forward-looking artistic vision continues to build on this legacy. For more information about The Apollo, visit www.ApolloTheater.org. 

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