#Aurin Squire

[o-druida-ebrio]

Séries: This Is Us

Criadores: Dan Fogelman, Kay Oyegun, Donald Todd e Aurin Squire

Emissora original: NBC

Ano: 2016 - 2022

[writemarcus]

Black, Queer, and Here

In a post-‘Moonlight’ world, writers like Michael R. Jackson and Jeremy O. Harris are making the case for LGBTQ stories that go beyond the gay white experience.

BY MARCUS SCOTT

Last month, when Michael R. Jackson’s A Strange Loop earned unanimous praise upon opening at Playwrights Horizons, it was a pivotal moment for me as a spectator. As someone who is also a Black, gay, musical theatre writer, I saw myself and my story onstage for the first time. I guffawed, clapped my hands, snapped along, celebrated the pageantry of Black excellence, and even teared up a bit during the play’s climax.

For the first time I didn’t have to undertake the mental gymnastics all marginalized people are basically required to do once they enter the theatre; to empathize with the white, often male protagonist as default. Not to mention, there was additional apprehension. Any time I saw a story centered on LGBTQ characters, I could usually predict what I was getting myself into: either comedic NutraSweet schmaltz with heart, or a maudlin tragedy where happy endings are laughable and everyone dies in the end.

But this was different. Led by a colossal, virtuoso performance from Larry Owens—not to mention anchored by an all-Black, all-queer ensemble of multitalented, triple-threat featured players—A Strange Loop (now extended through July 28) is a singular, seminal Bildungsroman that casts a subversive, critical third eye on both mainstream and nether regions of the Black gay American experience that had not been shown before.

The show follows Usher (Owens), a young, NYU-educated, overweight Black gay man working as an usher at a long-running Broadway musical and struggling to write a musical about a young, NYU-educated, overweight Black gay man working as an usher at a long-running Broadway musical and struggling to write a musical (hence the loop in the title). A Strange Loop is a visceral, soulful, psychosexual panoramic pièce de résistance that may just be the most radical Off-Broadway musical of its kind. Contextualizing everything from #MeToo, Moonlight, Tyler Perry, Stephen Sondheim’s Company, and second wave feminism, Jackson’s show is a potpourri of popular culture, existentialism, and metafiction—a dazzling coming-of-age artistic journey of self-discovery.

My sentiments for the show have been shared. In a post-show talkback on June 19, “Pose” star Billy Porter joined Jackson, choreographer Raja Feather Kelly, and playwright Branden Jacobs-Jenkins onstage to discuss the musical. The event, which was attended by top names in the theatre community (such as Lin-Manuel Miranda), was presented by Ucross, a prestigious residency program in northeast Wyoming. Porter choked back tears as he began the panel: “To sit up there and see my life onstage, when everybody said that my story wasn’t valid—to see that up there, to see it so brave, and to see it so bold. To see it so truthful, so complicated, so honest, and so unapologetic, has been one of the most wonderful nights for me in the theatre.”

Over the course of the 2018-19 season, I saw 100 shows, and few of them affected me like Jackson’s musical. None of those other shows centered on queer bodies of color. In all fairness, it’s not like a lot of theatres are producing plays by or about queer people of color. And when they do, it’s sanitized, ambiguous, and not complex—for example, Celie and Shug’s neutered romance in The Color Purple.

Earlier this year, in a lively panel about the state of the American play (copresented by American Theatre and Signature Theatre), playwright and director Robert O’Hara wryly offered some insight into the queer POC experience in American theatre. Speaking about the 2017-18 season, O’Hara pondered the state of Broadway, which was littered with prestige London transfers or star-driven assembly line revivals of treasured classics. But he also noticed a third trend: “the amount of gay white men we have on Broadway this year.” Naming Angels in America, The Boys in the Band, and Torch Song, all of which were written by white gay men, O’Hara remarked, “There’s too many white gay people, particularly white gay men and their struggle being white and gay and male. Do we really need that many conversations? To some people, that’s diversity. But to me, that’s just more white folks onstage.”  

Though theatre prides itself on being a space for outcasts, and most of its preeminent artists are gay men, their visibility often comes at the expense of other members of the LGBTQ community. In the theatre, LGBTQ plays have often centered solely on the experience of gay white cis-men and (only recently) cis-women, while people of color war in the margins for mainstream acclaim.

Whether it’s about the gay civil rights movement (Mart Crowley’s seminal The Boys In The Band, Dustin Lance Black’s 8), the HIV/AIDS epidemic (Larry Kramer’s definitive The Normal Heart, Tony Kushner’s iconic Angels in America, William Finn’s neurotic Falsettos) or communal inherited trauma (Moisés Kaufman’s triumphant docudrama The Laramie Project, Matthew Lopez’s Broadway-bound The Inheritance), gay white men have dominated queer stories, creating nuanced characters and becoming the epicenter of the narratives of LGBTQ culture.

Openly gay Black artists like O’Hara and George C. Wolfe have created work about Black queer life over three decades, but their numbers were fewer and far between. The difference now is the sheer volume of diverse queer voices. Some are even calling it a renaissance.

I trace it to the film Moonlight. Released in 2016 to universal acclaim under the helm of director Barry Jenkins, and based on Tarell Alvin McCraney’s unpublished semi-autobiographical play In Moonlight Black Boys Look Blue, Moonlight became the first film with an all-Black cast and the first LGBTQ film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture. The victory was a watershed moment in popular culture, sparking public interest in Black art and queer stories.

Ever since, queer Black theatre artists have begun to storm the proverbial tower in droves: McCraney recently returned to Steppenwolf in Chicago with Ms. Blakk For President, and his Choir Boy had an acclaimed run on Broadway after making the rounds of the nation’s regional theatres. Donja R. Love, an HIV-positive gay Black playwright, saw the world premieres of his queer period dramas Sugar in Our Wounds and Fireflies. Jordan Cooper’s Ain’t No Mo earned an extended and lauded run Off-Broadway at the Public Theater. Hailed as “The Queer Black Savior the Theater World Needs” by Out magazine, Jeremy O. Harris became a literary sensation and enfant terrible of the theatre world after Slave Play and Daddy had their world premieres this past season (Slave Play will transfer to Broadway in September).

What makes these plays radical is their candor, addressing the audience with frank depictions of queer Black life. Most importantly, these are plays that are creating discourse on what artist Lora Mathis calls radical softness, or “the idea that unapologetically sharing your emotions is a political move and a way to combat the societal idea that feelings are a sign of weakness.” In one of the most pivotal scenes in Choir Boy, one of the boys chooses an a cappella rendition of “Love Ballad” (originally by Jeffrey Osborne of L.T.D.) to express his love for another boy, but imagination ends up being the closest he’ll ever get to confessing his feelings. In Sugar in Our Wounds, an enslaved man offers another reading lessons, but the subtext is that of romantic yearning. In Slave Play, an interracial gay couple undergo therapy, in an effort to reconnect. These writers subvert and comment on the oppressive systems that affect disenfranchised and marginalized people without attacking or distancing mainstream audiences.

Not to mention the playwrights who identify as queer but whose plays aren’t chiefly about LGBTQ life: Colman Domingo (Dot), Marcus Gardley (The House That Will Not Stand), Jonathan Norton (My Tidy List of Terrors), Timothy DuWhite (Neptune), Keelay Gipson (#NewSlaves), Korde Arrington Tuttle (clarity), Jirèh Breon Holder (Too Heavy for Your Pocket) and Derek Lee McPhatter (Bring the Beat Back). Chief among these is Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, who was listed among the Top 20 Most-Produced Playwrights of 2018-2019 and has been honored as a two-time finalist for the 2016 and 2018 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, respectively.

As writer-activist Darnell L. Moore noted on Twitter: “In the past few months, I’ve witnessed displays of brilliance—Black queer men who have created theatrical works that dig into the complex interior lives of Black characters. Their works disrupt & reimagine all we believe to be true about the limits of Blackness, of gender. They poke at the grounds of Black radical politics by illuminating how the freedom dreams conjured by some of the Blacks often function as nightmares for some others—trans folk, queers, drag queens, the not-respectable. They remind us about the futility of white liberalism. They refuse the white gaze.” He characterized these plays as “Black folks-loving art works” which “preach and sing and lament and celebrate and bear witness and take up arms and push and pull us.”

At the same time, Moore does wonder “how these works might be received if the creators and/or main actors weren’t Black gay men.” He has a point: Queer women, trans, or gender non-binary writers still struggle to be seen, with only a few receiving recognition such as Aziza Barnes (BLKS), Tanya Barfield (Bright Half Life), Tracey Scott Wilson (Buzzer), Nissy Aya (righteous kill, a requiem), and Ianne Fields Stewart (A Complicated Woman).

While many Black artists are generating work that are nuanced and empowering, and even dissecting of the white gaze, there are still just as many works that default towards “enterpainment.” Coined by playwright Aurin Squire in his play Zoohouse, “enterpainment” is a trope that calls for historically oppressed people to be forced into situations where they must put their suffering and victimhood on display for the education and edification of the masses. This exercise in emotional masochism has been at the forefront of many Black plays, with this trope being weaponized and commodified. Many Black characters in general are defined by their pain, and in plays that center on LGBTQ people of color, too often that pain is doubled because of their race and sexual orientation.

The “bury your gays” stereotype is still very much the norm for these plays, including some of the ones mentioned above. For example, in Donja R. Love’s Fireflies, the protagonist is a woman who clings to the memory of the woman she loved who was horribly murdered in the streets. The main character in Chisa Hutchinson’s She Like Girls is a 16-year-old lesbian who is shot and killed at the climax of the play.

Most stories featuring queer characters of color forefront the atrocities that inherently arise from the stigmatization of one’s sexual agency and one’s race. Rather than showcasing the beauty within the full expression of queerness—such as falling in love or (in A Strange Loop) standing up to your parents—too often writers are defaulting to trauma.

But this is part of a larger issue: that of Black artists working within a primarily white system who feel they must commodify their pain for white consumption. And of white producers not feeling like they’re able to challenge artists of color to look deeper, of them thinking of these artists as a single diversity slot or purveyor of issue plays, instead of artists whose careers and ideas need to be invested in. At the live event, Robert O’Hara had some advice for white producers: “You have to be able to live inside the power and the privilege that you have, and also continue to demand the rigor, intellect, and dexterity that the work requires so that it does not just become a play but a [major stepping stone for a] career.”

Recently I ran into Jackson at Musical Theatre Factory’s High Five, a gala hosted at Town Stages; he was being honored that night. Before I could congratulate him, he kindly rebuffed. “There’s still work to be done,” he said as he was greeted by eager patrons and admirers. He’s not wrong. In 2017, Pew found that younger, non-white, and low-income people (lower middle-class people of color) were more likely to self-identify as LGBTQ than whites, debunking the myth that Blacks and Latinos are overwhelmingly homophobic.

Reality is more complex than we give it credit for. And considering that Broadway is in need of new musicals in it’s 2019-20 season, there really is nothing more topical than, to quote A Strange Loop, a “big, Black, and queer-ass Broadway show.”

Marcus Scott is a New York-based playwright, musical writer and journalist. He’s written for Elle, Essence, Out and Playbill, among other publications.

[antiphon]

Liz, soft and a little hoarse: I’m just thinking.

Diane: About what?

/ 

I think it’s very possible that we’re at the apex of their relationship in this scene. Even when Diane thinks Liz is going to say something she really disagrees with, she’s soft and curious; even when Liz thinks Diane doesn’t and won’t want to get where she’s coming from, she’s willing to try to explain. Diane will listen, more or less, even though she doesn’t get it. This is also one of the most anti-chaos moments we’ve seen on this show probably at all, and it’s taken so much work to build to it, when the direction of the show is usually toward disorder. It’s amazing that they’ve gotten here, honestly, but/and there are all kinds of things moving in the show that could make it worse from this point. (For one, Diane doesn’t really get it.) (And besides the general approach of the series to lean into chaos, I don’t have any reason to trust this show with characters caring about each other. I can hardly think of another moment this soft that it’s ever had. But this is really lovely.)

[queer-is-the-universe]

Parallels TGF 1x4 and TGF 2x8

[d-criss-news]

A host of Broadway favorites will take part in Broadway for Biden's upcoming fundraiser, In Our America: A Concert for the Soul of the Nation, which will stream on YouTube via NowThis October 21 at 8 PM ET to benefit the Biden Victory Fund.

Directed by Tony nominee Liesl Tommy (Eclipsed), In Our America will feature more than 75 artists, including Derrick Baskin, Laura Benanti, Victoria Clark, Glenn Close, Chuck Cooper, Darren Criss, André De Shields, Renée Elise Goldsberry, John Goodman, Jayne Houdyshell, Jennifer Hudson, James Monroe Iglehart, LaTanya Richardson Jackson, Samuel L. Jackson, Norman Lear, Norm Lewis, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Rita Moreno, Karen Olivo, Ashley Park, Steven Pasquale, Carrie Preston, Kelani Queypo, Chita Rivera, Daphne Rubin-Vega, Phillipa Soo, Ephraim Sykes, BD Wong, the Broadway Dreams Foundation Choir, and the casts of SIX and KPOP.

Viewers can expect new stagings of classic Broadway tunes, previews of Broadway-aimed productions, and speeches that acknowledge the stakes of the present with a hopeful eye toward a better future.

The event, hosted by Broadway Unlocked, will also include contributions by six-time Tony nominee Chad Beguelin (The Prom, Aladdin), Pulitzer Prize winner Tony Kushner (Angels in America), two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage (Sweat, Ruined), Robert O’Hara (Bootycandy), Stacey Rose (America v. 2.1: The Sad Demise & Eventual Extinction of The American Negro), Aurin Squire (This Is Us), DeLanna Studi (And So We Walked), Pulitzer Prize winner Paula Vogel (Indecent, How I Learned to Drive), and John Waters (Hairspray).

The creative team includes choreographers Lorin Latarro (Mrs. Doubtfire, Waitress), Tony winner Christopher Gattelli (Newsies, The King and I), Ray Mercer (The Lion King), and Abbey O’Brien (associate choreographer, Jagged Little Pill and Waitress), with music direction by Tony winner Jason Michael Webb (Choir Boy) and orchestrations by Oscar nominee and six-time Emmy winner Chris Boardman (The Color Purple, The Wiz films) and Charlie Rosen (Moulin Rouge!, Be More Chill). Sean McLaughlin (Bullets to Books) serves as director of photography, and Grady Bowman (The Cher Show) is associate choreographer.

“It is a tremendous honor to direct this incredible collective of performers and artists, who are coming together to amplify the promise of Broadway and a nation that are future-looking, accessible, and deeply inclusive,” Tommy says. “Our theatres and entertainment venues may be currently dark, but our role is easy to see: we must support Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to ensure their unequivocal victory in November.”

Tommy also serves as executive producer alongside Julie Boardman, Nolan Doran, Halle Morse, and Jennifer Mudge.

[feminism-quotes]

Aurin Squire

[znewstech]

Uzo Aduba to star in 'All Her Little Secrets' limited series - Times of India

Uzo Aduba to star in ‘All Her Little Secrets’ limited series – Times of India

Emmy winner Uzo Aduba is set to star in and executive produce the “All Her Little Secrets” series. The one-hour limited series is based on Wanda M Morris’ bestselling novel of the same name. According to media reports, the show hails from Aurin Squire who penned the pilot. Reform Media Group and CBS Studios are backing the project. The story centres on Ellice Littlejohn (Aduba), a Black female…

[biggoldbelt]

Writer Aurin Squire Interview| The Good Fight & Evil | Paramount+

Writer Aurin Squire Interview| The Good Fight & Evil | Paramount+

Writer Aurin Squire Interview| The Good Fight & Evil | Paramount+ –Aurin Squire is a playwright, journalist, and supervising producer for EVIL and THE GOOD FIGHT. His journalism pieces for THE NEW REPUBLIC, TALKING POINTS MEMO, TAKE PART have highlighted #BlackLivesMatter, police brutality, and white fragility. Squire’s plays OBAMA-OLOGY, DEFACING MICHAEL JACKSON, and ZOOHOUSE represent a…

[thenoticeblog]

A Look Back at 2020 and 2021...

Hey Folx!

So, we here at The Notice Blog have been hard at work over the last two years, and wanted to share with you the projects we were able to manifest with your support.

This spans everything from investigative journalism, experimental films, boundary-pushing music videos, and our current feature film effort: the Afrofuturist, Anti-Capitalist, Womanist Horror script, Willow.

Thank you all for supporting us in our mission to champion and develop narratives from marginalized communities. If you are excited by our work, please make a tax-deductible contribution to support our nonprofit here.

And without further ado, let’s take a look at the past two years 2020 - 2021:

Willow (Full Production) Willow is set in an alternate reality where people feed on the weak to survive - Black and Brown communities are targeted the most. Until the tables turn... at a price. Willow follows a community activist’s fight to pay that price at whatever cost. The script hones in on ideas of inequality, racism, capitalism, surveillance, policing, and gender, where the world of the film explores the possible future consequences of our present reality.

A Good Haunting (Full Production) I had the privilege to direct in collaboration with Holland Andrews and Katrina Reid on this film. We wanted to produce an exciting experimental film that addresses mental health, healing, and the supernatural.

05.07.21 Test Shoot (Full Production) Celebrating and Centering Black Spaces, memory, joy, flexing, the fluidity and deconstruction of gender and so much more “Test Shoot” takes on a life of its own. As NIC playfully explores different forms of physical Black expression, they give new light and appreciation to the fruit of Black spaces.

Release (Co-Production: Co-Directing, Editing, Director of Photography, Gaffing, PA) Awards: Winner of Best Experimental Film at the 2020 Fargo Moorhead LGBTQ Festival  Official Selection of the Queer 2 Queer Festival. Official Selection of the 2021 NYC Downtown Short Film Festival Honorable Mention at the London Seasonal Short Film Festival Official Selection of the 2021 Bitesize Film Festival The 2021 Gold Award for Experimental Film at the Hollywood Gold Awards The 2021 Special Jury Award at the Uruvatti International Film Festival

Here’s a film that I’m REALLY proud of: “Release.” I co-directed, edited and DP’d (director of photography) on it. And I was smart enough to ask for help from Katrina Reid (1st AD/ Production Manager), Dominik Czaczyk (Gaffer/2nd Camera) & Sultan Ali (Grip/2nd AC). After nearly two months of pre-production, we managed to turn two days of shooting into a masterpiece.

Snakes Dance Too (Full Production) An experimental dance film A meditation on shadows and light An interplay of repetition and flipped perspectives A call and response between black creatives

Dance, projections, & Esperanza Spalding’s entrancing music, all come together in multimedia, multi-sensory experience. It’s a tribute, a conversation across disciplines, and a celebration of creativity during the 2020 Quarantine era. This film was originally created as the projected backdrop to Katrina Reid’s improvised live performance, presented by Dance in Bushwick.

Mirrors (Co-Production: Co-Directing, Co-Producing, Editing, Director of Photography, Gaffing, Audio, Grips, PAs) When 17-year-old Alma Jean finds her mother dead, she must pack up her life and move in with her mother's ex-lover, a woman she doesn't know. Her new guardian, Bird Wilson, is the town pariah and unused to sharing her home. Will mourning the death of a shared loved one bring Alma Jean and Bird together or push them further apart?

“Mirrors” was commissioned as part of a playwriting residency by Freedom Train Productions (Andre Lancaster, Artistic Director; Aurin Squire, Director of New Play Development) in 2010. Mirrors received a staged reading as part of Freedom Train Productions’ FIRE! New Play Festival on July 23, 2010. The reading was directed by Mekeva McNeil.

Como Eres (Full Production) Como Eres is a short film highlighting the tradition of Bomba, a dance style & music developed in Puerto Rico. Its strongest influences coming from West African culture via TransAtlantic Slavery. The word Bomba describes the rum barrels, enslaved Africans repurposed into drums.

Traditionally, “Bailadores” (male dancers) perform their “Piquetes” with their body and the “Bailadoras” (female dancers) perform with the body and/or skirt with the petticoat. However, Milteri of bomba dance company wanted to do something different. She wanted to challenge gender constructs behind this.

Keep At It (Full Production) Celebrating and Centering Black Spaces, memory, joy, flexing, the fluidity and deconstruction of gender and so much more "Keep at It" takes on a life of its own. As NIC playfully explores different forms of physical Black expression, they give new light and appreciation to the fruit of Black spaces. A handball court in Brooklyn becomes the backdrop of a sharp Trap music video. Here, the Projects receive homage, not disdain. Each moment, swells into layered and subtle messages meant to keep us guessing until then.

This video was featured in part of NIC Kay's #blackpeopledancingontheinternet residency at the New Museum in June 2021.

Ok Trombone - Giffen Good (Full Production) Imagine something that becomes more valuable, the more you sell it. That’s a Giffen Good.

Jim suggested we do something on Wall Street and Time square to centers of capitalism. All we needed was a Dancer who could embody the everyman trapped in this world of consumerism and superficial valuations. I suggested the uncanny Orlando Hunter, a stunning performer & choreographer I met a couple of years ago. And everyone agreed. But we had no idea just how much brilliance he would bring to set that day.

Immaculate Re-Conception of Kraig Lewis, and Defund NYPD (Full Production). Both are part of a larger series called: The Gang Database Series: Stop and Frisk 2.0:

This documentary follows local activists partnering with the Legal Aid Society, Just Leadership USA (JLUSA), NAACP Legal Defense Fund, Bronx Defenders, Brooklyn Defenders, and more to ban the use of "gang databases" by the NYPD.

But this time, community members and activists alike are also bringing with them a philosophy and practice that fundamentally changes everything: Abolish the Police.

We’ll cover a litany of activists across the country, who are both fighting against over-policing, and providing healthy alternatives, under the philosophy of “Abolish the Police.

Other Notable Projects:

Tell Me a Story & I’ll Write you a Poem shooting, editing, producing Sweet Water - panel discussion + screening shooting, editing, producing The whole thing shooting, editing, producing Pass Me That Vaporizer - directing, editing, producing Georgia Mud - shooting, editing, producing “Unbroken” Quarantine - cinematographer, choreography Sub(urban) Archives - lighting  Black Thoughts - Co-Opting Capitalism Program -  State Garden Rumba - Pregones Theater series celebrating Nuyorican history and culture in the Bronx - cinematography, editing,  At the Wall - special video for Re-Entry Rocks virtual gala - editor The Backstory - Official Selection into the Just Us Film Festival The Apartment - Commissioned by Mecca McDonald - exploring themes of body positivity, Black love and healthy breakups. - producer & editor Fiscal Sponsorship Program  -  Neu Lunch | Digital Drama Class - editor & Fiscal Sponsor EcoMundo Fundraising Video - Workers Co-Op for domestic workers The Notice Foundation Programs editor Greenwashing Video for Pildora Sustainably-Sourced Clothing Brand based out of Mexico City - Editor producer Finding (Norm)al - Editor School for Legends Promo - Editor Strange Fruit Video - Editor Here by Kendra Foster, Grammy award-winning R&B artist Eugenia Shea Butter commercials 1, 2, 3

THE NOTICE FOUNDATION PROGRAMS

Your contributions specifically support the Notice Blog’s 7 Main Programs. Through these initiatives, we’ve helped provide Online drama courses for middle schoolers, quality production to BIPOC & Queer artists like Mykal Kilgore & Azure D Ozborne-Lee. Take a look at Our Programs below:

TNB Studios - Offering affordable video production to marginalized clients and marginalized narratives. This ongoing project seeks to expand access to high-quality, award-winning video production and editing to BIPOC/Queer/Immigrant businesses and activist groups & narratives. As a result, we’re adding equity back into the film industry for underprivileged/distressed people, as well as helping eliminate prejudice and discrimination in the film industry.

The Notice Blog - Our primary focus is to provide a news media platform that not only focuses investigative news reporting on issues concerning underrepresented communities but also sustains a space for journalists/activists/everyday people from underrepresented communities to tell the news from their perspective, as well as express their experiences and viewpoints through creative narratives. The goal is to help foster underserved communities’ participation in digital media, which will subsequently further gains in employment in the fields of journalism & digital media, as well as help further community involvement in social justice initiatives concerning their own respective communities.

The Willow Project - focuses on hiring BIPOC folx behind the camera, as well as in front of the camera, requiring that the production hire 90% BIPOC folx, hire locally, work safely (according to SAG-AFTRA safety guidelines), and host an ongoing series of panel discussions and workshops for BIPOC/Queer/Marginalized folx in media. And that’s not just through furthering representation of BIPOC in “White spaces,” but by continuing to encourage their employment in positions of power throughout the entire filmmaking process.

The Notice Blog Film Festival Spotlighting and rewarding ground-breaking work in Journalism, Art, and Activism. This project seeks promote media that helps eliminate prejudice and discrimination, as well as the advancement of education about topics and issues pertinent to marginalized communities living in the US.

Fiscal Sponsorship - Offering funding opportunities for BIPOC/Queer/Immigrant journalists, artists, and activist groups/projects with charitable purposes. 

Co-Op Capitalism Program - Launching self-sustainable business initiatives that primarily support liberation through various methods. Our first project initiative, Black Thoughts, was a therapeutic Mango Shea Butter that donated 10% of gross sales profit to the Movement For Black Lives, and the United Negro College Fund. Helped eliminate prejudice and discrimination; defending human and civil rights secured by law;

The Jade Marie Notice Artist Grant This year, we’re offering our very FIRST Artist Grant for $2,500 to a multidisciplinary artist to commission them for a project that channels our motto: “Always Question. Always Explore.”

Submit to: Paul A. Notice II  | 1914 Palmetto St., Apt 1L, Ridgewood, NY 11385 | 917-593-0369 | paul@thenoticeblog.com

Personal Statement, Name, Address, Portfolio of Related Work, Resume, References, Project Description & Explanation of why Project relates to our charity's goals and values.

Applications Accepted Beginning: February 24th, 2022

Application Deadline: June 31, 2022

Notification of Winner: August 1, 2022

Project Debut:  November 10th, 2022

Applicant MUST be living within the United States, 25 years or older, and qualify as a working artist.

[o-druida-ebrio]

Séries: This Is Us

Criadores: Dan Fogelman, Kay Oyegun, Donald Todd e Aurin Squire

Emissora original: NBC

Ano: 2016 - 2022

[fuckyeahgreatplays]

Why are there so many plays with similar themes being commissioned by the major theaters? Recently, to name a few, there have been countless plays about gun violence, education, and rich powerful people screwing over the less fortunate. Is it relevance and zeitgeist or lazy and uncreative programmers?

I think relevance and zeitgeist are big factors. Also, I had a looong conversation about this with playwright Aurin Squire recently, and he mentioned that it happens a lot as certain articles go viral, certain works enter public domain, etc. Multiple people will begin developing works based on these ideas, shopping them around, getting grants, and since most of the bigger institutions are on the same pipeline and production schedule, you’ll suddenly get a whole crop of plays based on the same things. 

And that’s showbiz, baby. 

[queer-is-the-universe]

Solomon: And did he tell you all this in the classroom?

Holly: No.

Solomon: I see. Where did he tell you this?

Adrian: Objection, Your Honor. Relevance?

Solomon: It helps the jury gauge the value of the statement, Your Honor.

Judge: Overruled.

Holly: No, it wasn't in the classroom. It was in a private setting.

Solomon: What kind of a private setting?

Adrian: Again, objection, Your Honor, as to relevance.

Judge: Ms. Westfall, you've been told to answer the question.

Holly: I had a relationship with Mr. McVeigh, and he shared this with me then.

Solomon: In bed?

Holly: Your Honor, I would really prefer - not to discuss my -

Solomon: It goes to Ms. Westfall's knowledge of Mr. McVeigh.

Judge: You are, uh you're under oath, Ms. Westfall.

Holly: Yes, I believe it was in bed.

Solomon: You believe that Mr. McVeigh still has these same beliefs and concerns, though, isn't that right?

Holly: Yes. And why is that? Uh, because we've discussed cases since then.

Solomon: At ballistics conferences?

Holly: No.

Solomon: Where then? HOLLY: We still socialize.

Holly: We get drinks sometimes.

Solomon: And you have no reason to believe that Mr. McVeigh would not tell you what he was thinking and feeling?

Holly: I've never known him to lie to me.

[serieouslymovieing]

Título original This Is Us (TV Series)

Año 2016

Duración 60 min.

País Estados Unidos Estados Unidos

Dirección Dan Fogelman (Creator),  Glenn Ficarra,  John Requa,  Silas Howard,  Craig Zisk, Sarah Pia Anderson,  Helen Hunt,  Uta Briesewitz,  Ken Olin

Guion Dan Fogelman, Isaac Aptaker, Elizabeth Berger, Bekah Brunstetter, Vera Herbert, Joe Lawson, Kay Oyegun, Aurin Squire, K.J. Steinberg, Donald Todd, Regina King

Música Siddhartha Khosla

Fotografía Yasu Tanida, Brett Pawlak

Reparto Mandy Moore,  Milo Ventimiglia,  Chrissy Metz,  Justin Hartley,  Sterling K. Brown, Gerald McRaney,  Susan Kelechi Watson,  Chris Sullivan,  Ron Cephas Jones, Eris Baker,  Janet Montgomery,  Brittany Ishibashi,  Caitlin Thompson, Milana Vayntrub,  Jon Huertas,  Chris Grace,  Sylvester Stallone,  Michael Angarano, Melanie Liburd

Productora Emitida por National Broadcasting Company (NBC); 20th Century Fox Television

Género Serie de TV. Drama. Comedia | Comedia dramática. Familia

Sinopsis Serie de TV (2016-Actualidad). 3 temporadas. 36+18 (3T) episodios. Serie que mezcla drama y comedia, sobre personas que nacieron el mismo día. La fecha de nacimiento como nexo de los diferentes protagonistas que hará que sus vidas se crucen y cambien para siempre. Entre los personajes están Rebecca (Moore) y Jack (Ventimiglia), una pareja de Pittsburgh que espera trillizos. (FILMAFFINITY)

Premios 2018: Emmy: Mejor actor invitado (Ron Cephas Jones). 5 nominaciones 2017: Emmy: Mejor actor (Sterling K. Brown) y actor invitado (McRaney). 8 nomin. 2017: Globos de Oro: Mejor actor drama (Sterling K. ) 2016: Globos de Oro: Nomin. a mejor serie drama y actriz secundaria (Metz & Moore) 2018: American Film Institute (AFI): Top 10 - Mejores Programas de TV del año 2017: American Film Institute (AFI): Top 10 - Mejores Programas de TV del año 2016: American Film Institute (AFI): Top 10 - Mejores Programas de TV del año 2018: Critics Choice Awards: Nomin. a mejor actor (Ventimiglia) y actor sec (Hartley) 2017: Critics Choice Awards: Mejor actor drama (Sterling K. Brown) 2016: Critics Choice Awards: Nominada a mejor serie drama 2018: Sindicato de Productores (PGA): Nominada a mejor serie de TV - Drama 2018: Sindicato de Guionistas (WGA): Nominada a mejor guion episodio serie drama 2016: Sindicato de Guionistas (WGA): Mejor guión en un episodio de serie dramática 2018: Sindicato de Actores (SAG): Mejor reparto serie drama 2017: Sindicato de Actores (SAG): Mejor reparto y actor (Sterling K. Brown) 2016: Sindicato de Actores (SAG): Nominada a mejor actor drama (Sterling K. Brown) 2018: Satellite Awards: Nominada a Mejor serie drama 2017: Satellite Awards: Nominada a mejor serie de comedia o musical 2017: Premios Críticos de Televisión (TCA): Nueva serie/programa. 4 nominaciones

[queensugardaily]

The 1st Annual Black Reel Awards for Television Nominees

Outstanding Drama Series

Outstanding Actor, Drama Series Sterling K. Brown | “This Is Us” (NBC) Mike Colter | “Luke Cage” (Netflix) Aldis Hodge | “Underground” (WGN) Terrence Howard | “Empire” (FOX) Kofi Siriboe | “Queen Sugar” (OWN)

Outstanding Actress, Drama Series Viola Davis | “How to Get Away With Murder” (ABC) Dawn-Lyen Gardner | “Queen Sugar” (OWN) Taraji P. Henson | “Empire” (FOX) Jurnee Smollett-Bell | “Underground” (WGN) Rutina Wesley | “Queen Sugar” (OWN)

Outstanding Directing, Drama Series “I Call Marriage” (This is Us) | Director: George Tillman Jr. (NBC) “First Things First” (Queen Sugar) | Director: Ava Duvernay (OWN) “A Furnace for You” (Empire) | Director: Sanaa Hamri (FOX) “One by One, Into the Dark” (The Get Down) | Director: Clark Johnson (Netflix) “You Know My Steez” (Luke Cage) | Director: Clark Johnson (Netflix)

Outstanding Writing, Drama Series “First Things First” (Queen Sugar) | Written by: Ava DuVernay (OWN) “Moment of Truth” (Luke Cage) | Written by: Cheo Hodari Coker (Netflix) “The Right Thing to Do” (This Is Us) | Written by: Aurin Squire (NBC) “There Are Worse Things Than Murder” (How to Get Away With Murder) | Written by: Angela Robinson (ABC) “Toll & Trouble, Pt 1” (Empire) | Written by: Diane Ademu-John & Eric Haywood (FOX)