Guys and Dolls is a musical with music and lyrics by Frank Loesser and book by Jo Swerling and Abe Burrows. It is based on "The Idyll of Miss Sarah Brown" (1933) and "Blood Pressure", which are two short stories by Damon Runyon, and also borrows characters and plot elements from other Runyon stories, such as "Pick the Winner".
The Classical Theatre of Harlem (CTH) is an off-broadway professional theatre company founded in 1999 at the Harlem School for the Arts. Producing on average 2-3 productions a year as well as implementing extensive educational programming, CTH remains the only year round theatre company operating on an Actor's Equity Association LORT contract in Harlem. Its season selections present a world repertory ranging from Euripides to Derek Walcott, featuring classical and new emerging playwrights. Since its founding, CTH has put on over 40+ productions, which have received numerous AUDELCO, OBIE, Drama Desk, American Theatre Wing and Lucille Lortel nominations and awards.
André Robin De Shields is an American actor, singer, dancer, director, and choreographer.
Lynn Nottage is an American playwright whose work often focuses on the experience of working-class people, particularly working-class people who are Black. She has received the Pulitzer Prize for Drama twice: in 2009 for her play Ruined, and in 2017 for her play Sweat. She was the first woman to have won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama two times.
Richard Wesley is an American playwright and screenwriter. He is an associate professor at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts in the Rita and Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing.
Norm Lewis is an American actor and singer. He has appeared in Europe, on Broadway, in film, television, recordings and regional theatre. Productions that he has been involved in include Dessa Rose, Miss Saigon, The Wild Party, Les Misérables, The Little Mermaid, and several others.
Gertrude Hadley Jeannette was an American playwright and film and stage actress. She is also known for being the first woman to work as a licensed taxi driver in New York City, which she began doing in 1942. Despite being blacklisted during the Red Scare in the 1950s, she wrote five plays and founded the H.A.D.L.E.Y. Players in Harlem, New York, remaining active in mentoring African-American actors in New York City. In the 1960s and 1970s she appeared in Broadway productions such as The Long Dream, Nobody Loves an Albatross, The Amen Corner, The Skin of Our Teeth and Vieux Carré. She also appeared in films such as Cotton Comes to Harlem in 1969, Shaft in 1971, and Black Girl in 1972. She acted into her 80s and retired from directing theater at the age of 98.
Derek McLane is an American set designer for theatre, opera, and television. He graduated with a BA from Harvard College and an MFA from the Yale School of Drama.
Osceola Marie Macarthy Adams, known by the stage name Osceola Archer, was one of the first Black actresses to appear on Broadway in Between Two Worlds in 1934. Speaking of Adams' decade-long role as director of some three dozen productions at the Putnam County Playhouse, actor Carl Harms noted she was likely also the first African-American director of summer stock.
Vinie Burrows is an American stage actress on Broadway.
Marion Isaac McClinton was an American theatre director, playwright, and actor. He was nominated for the Tony Award for King Hedley II. He won the 2000 Vivian Robinson Audelco Black Theatre Awards, Director/Dramatic Production and the 1999–2000 Obie Awards, Direction, for Jitney, and was nominated for the Drama Desk Award.
Alfred Preisser is an American theater director, playwright, producer and teacher of acting. He currently is the Artistic Director and Theater Director at Harlem School of the Arts.
Lia Chang is an American actress, journalist, and photographer. After beginning her career modeling and acting in New York and on tour, Chang added parallel careers as a portrait and botanical photographer and journalist.
Linda Margaret Powell is an American actress.
Voza Rivers is an American producer and co-producer of theater, film, music, and live events, born in Harlem, New York. Rivers’ work as a theater producer, music executive, event producer, and documentary filmmaker has been presented in the United States, Japan, South Africa, Togo, Nigeria, Cuba, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
Loretta Agatha Abbott was an American educator, dancer, choreographer, singer, director, dance captain, and actress. She was an early member and foundation builder for the Alvin Ailey Dance Company. She was also a founding member of the Clark Center for the Performing Arts, and worked with the organization from 1959 to 1989.
The Harlem Repertory Theatre was founded in 2004 by Keith Lee Grant, a Theatre professor at City College with a goal of making theatre accessible to the Harlem community. They primarily seek to present shows that explore issues of class and race. Harlem Rep performed for seven summer seasons at Aaron Davis Hall before moving off campus to the 133rd Street Arts Center. It was at this venue that Harlem Rep's production of Dreamgirls ran and received AUDELCO awards in a number of categories. After two years, the company moved to a larger space in the Tato Laviera Theatre in East Harlem. Among the productions at their East Harlem Home are: A Raisin in the Sun in 2017, Sweet Charity (2019), and Harburg & Saidy's Jamaica (2017).
Harrison David Rivers is an American playwright. Rivers' work has won him the Relentless Award, a GLAAD Media Award, a McKnight Fellowship for Playwrights, a Jerome Foundation Many Voices Fellowship, an Emerging Artist of Color Fellowship, a Van Lier Fellowship and the New York Stage & Film's Founders Award. He is based in Saint Paul, Minnesota and is married to Christopher Bineham.
Laurence Holder is an American playwright, poet, and director who focuses on the African-American experience. His plays often center historical African-American figures including Malcolm X, Elijah Muhammad, Thelonious Monk, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday, and Zora Neale Hurston. He is a 1998–1999 Otto Rene Castillo award recipient for political theatre. Holder's work has been performed at the Henry Street Settlement New Federal Theatre, the Ford Theatre, the American Place Theatre, and more. His work has been reviewed by The New York Times and the Washington Post among others. In addition to being a playwright, Holder teaches English at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
Merris Shirley Prendergast was a theater lighting designer notable for being the first African-American woman admitted to the United Scenic Artists’ lighting division in 1969. She was also the first African-American woman lighting designer on Broadway in 1973. Prendergast designed lighting for Broadway shows such as Waltz of the Stork, Amen Corner, and the Paul Robeson one-man show. She designed lighting for fifty years, well into her mid-80s. One of her last productions was Zora Neale Hurston: a Theatrical Biography in 2016.
