GIRL BE HEARD! Welcomes Joy Sunday From Netflix's WEDNESDAY For For a Talkback

Girl Be Heard, a Brooklyn based organization that amplifies and celebrates the voices of girls and young women of color through socially conscious theatre-making, storytelling and performance, will welcome WEDNESDAY actress Joy Sunday for a post-performance talk back following opening night of their 2023 Mainstage Performance, Organize!: Take it to the Streets, May 23 at Symphony Spaces' Leonard Nimoy Thalia Theater. Topics will include the importance of arts for the next generation, the role of the arts to make change in the community, and interesting insights into the trajectory and successes of Joy's career. 26, born in Staten Island, and a graduate of Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School and USC, Sunday is most known for her breakout role in Tim Burton's Netflix series, Wednesday, and her appearances in Dear White People, Bad Hair, and Shithouse.

Preceding the talk back, the Girl Be Heard's Artistic Company of nine professional young "artivists", ages 17-24, offer original music and personal narratives of racial justice, gender equity, environment justice and global solidarity, and other issues facing our communities today. Mobilizing a social movement to make change is the central theme to their mainstage evening length production Organize!: Take it to the Streets.

Directed and choreographed by Dr. Angela Fatou Gittens, the work is connected to this year's Girl Be Heard themes of activism and social action and is a reflection of the anchoring topics integral to Girl Be Heard and explored by the Company throughout the year. The Company will express the many phases and stages of what it takes to organize a movement, a social change, and even a revolution when masses of people become dissatisfied with their current conditions. Led by a cast of creative actors, poets, singers, and dancers, Organize!: Take it to the Streets highlights-in the name of social justice-not only what we see when organizers take to the streets; but the hard and strategic work that comes before calling on the general public to mobilize. By highlighting the personal interests of each cast member and connecting artistic practices to social issues, this production showcases the transformative power of artivism, and the importance of amplifying underrepresented voices.

"From justice in the streets of the U.S. South & Soweto to the streets of the Bronx to farmers' fields in India to the parking lots of U.S. hospitals with poor Black maternal health services, GBH's talented Company Members reflect on the emotional journeys of participants in movements past and present while helping audience members to develop an awareness of these historical moments," notes Fatou-Gittens.

"In keeping with this year's company theme "Organize!: Take it to the Streets", we aspire to provide the audience with a deeper awareness of the historical moments in social and justice movements, fostering a greater understanding of the common threads, struggles, and structural patterns that unite movements across the globe," adds Robin Jenkins, Interim Executive Director of Girl Be Heard. "This performance provides a unique glimpse into the behind-the-scenes preparation and emotional labor involved in a movement. The performers, who are girls and gender non-conforming youth from underrepresented communities in New York, offer their own experiences and insights to illuminate the lived realities of those who are so often silenced."