Charles Joseph "Buddy" Bolden was an American cornetist who was regarded by contemporaries as a key figure in the development of a New Orleans style of ragtime music, or "jass", which later came to be known as jazz.
Denzel Hayes Washington Jr. is an American actor, producer, and director. Known for his dramatic roles on stage and screen, The New York Times named him the greatest actor of the 21st century. He has received several accolades, including two Academy Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, and a Tony Award as well as nominations for two Emmy Awards and a Grammy Award. Washington has been honored with the Cecil B. DeMille Award in 2016, AFI Life Achievement Award in 2019, and the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2022.
August Wilson was an American playwright. He has been referred to as the "theater's poet of Black America". He is best known for a series of 10 plays, collectively called The Pittsburgh Cycle, which chronicle the experiences and heritage of the African-American community in the 20th century. Plays in the series include Fences (1987) and The Piano Lesson (1990), both of which won Wilson the Pulitzer Prize for Drama, as well as Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (1984) and Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1988). In 2006, Wilson was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.
Hill Street Blues is an American serial police procedural television series that aired on NBC in prime-time from January 15, 1981, to May 12, 1987, for 146 episodes. The show chronicles the lives of the Metropolitan Police Department staff of a single police station located on Hill Street in an unnamed large U.S. city. The "blues" are the police officers in their blue uniforms.
Ron Rifkin is an American actor best known for his roles as Arvin Sloane on the spy drama Alias, Saul Holden on the drama Brothers & Sisters, and District Attorney Ellis Loew in L.A. Confidential. He received the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical for his portrayal of Herr Schultz in the 1998 revival of Cabaret.
Phylicia Rashad is an American actress. She was most recently dean of the College of Fine Arts at Howard University before her three-year contract ended in May 2024. She is best known for her role as Clair Huxtable on the sitcom The Cosby Show (1984–1992) which earned her two Primetime Emmy Award nominations in 1985 and 1986. She also played Ruth Lucas on Cosby (1996–2000).
S. Epatha Merkerson is an American actress. She has received accolades for her work, including an Emmy Award, a Golden Globe Award, a Screen Actors Guild Award, four NAACP Image Awards, two Obie Awards, and two Tony Award nominations. She is known for her portrayal of NYPD Lieutenant Anita Van Buren on the NBC police procedural drama series Law & Order, a role she played from 1993 to 2010, appearing in 388 episodes of the series. She is also known for playing Reba the Mail Lady on Pee-wee's Playhouse and Sharon Goodwin in the NBC medical drama Chicago Med since the series premiered in November 2015.
Fences is a 1985 play by the American playwright August Wilson. Set in the 1950s, it is the sixth in Wilson's ten-part "Pittsburgh Cycle". Like all of the "Pittsburgh" plays, Fences explores the evolving African-American experience and examines race relations, among other themes. The play won the 1987 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 1987 Tony Award for Best Play. Fences was first developed at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center's 1983 National Playwrights Conference and premiered at the Yale Repertory Theatre in 1985.
Tamara Tunie is an American film, stage, and television actress, director, and producer. She is best known for her roles as attorney Jessica Griffin on the CBS soap opera As the World Turns and as medical examiner Melinda Warner in the NBC police drama Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (2000–2021). Tunie also appeared in films such as Rising Sun (1993), The Devil's Advocate (1997), The Caveman's Valentine (2001) receiving Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Female nomination, Flight (2012), and Whitney Houston: I Wanna Dance with Somebody (2022).
Georg Stanford Brown is an American actor and director, perhaps best known as one of the stars of the ABC police television series The Rookies from 1972 to 1976. On the show, Brown played the character of Officer Terry Webster.
King Hedley II is a play by American playwright August Wilson, the ninth in his ten-part series, The Pittsburgh Cycle. The play ran on Broadway in 2001 and was revived Off-Broadway in 2007.
Stephen McKinley Henderson is an American actor. Henderson trained at Juilliard School for acting and later became a resident member of the Repertory Theatre of St. Louis from 1976 to 1981. He came to prominence as a character actor often performing the plays of August Wilson. He has received nominations for two Tony Awards, a Drama Desk Award, and two Screen Actors Guild Awards. Vulture named Henderson as one of "The 32 Greatest Character Actors Working Today".
Joe Turner's Come and Gone is a play by American playwright August Wilson. It is the second installment of his decade-by-decade chronicle of the African-American experience, The Pittsburgh Cycle, also known as The Century Cycle. The play was first staged 1984 at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center in Waterford, Connecticut, and opened on Broadway on March 27, 1988, at the Ethel Barrymore Theatre—running for 105 performances. Directed by Lloyd Richards, the cast included Delroy Lindo as Herald Loomis and television and future movie star Angela Bassett, as Loomis's wife, Martha. A Broadway revival directed by Bartlett Sher opened at the Belasco Theatre on March 19, 2009 in previews and officially on April 16, closing June 14 after 69 performances. It was performed at the Mark Taper Forum in 2013. A new production opened at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago on April 13th, 2024.
Viola Davis is an American actress and film producer. Her accolades include both the Triple Crown of Acting and EGOT. Time named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2012 and 2017. In 2020, The New York Times ranked her ninth on its list of the greatest actors of the 21st century.
Ruben Santiago-Hudson is an American actor, playwright, and director who has won national awards for his work in all three categories. He is best known for his role of Captain Roy Montgomery from 2009 to 2011 on ABC's Castle. In November 2011, he appeared on Broadway in Lydia R. Diamond's play Stick Fly. In 2013, he starred in the TV series Low Winter Sun, a police drama set in Detroit. In 2021, he was nominated for best adaptation by the Screen Writers Guild for the film version of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom.
Brittany Leanna Robertson-Floyd, known professionally as Britt Robertson, is an American actress. She has appeared in the films The First Time (2012), Tomorrowland (2015), The Space Between Us (2017) and I Still Believe (2020).
Passing Strange is a comedy-drama rock musical about a young African American's journey of self-discovery as an artist, while combining strong existentialist and meta-fictional elements. The musical's lyrics and book are by Stew with music and orchestrations by Heidi Rodewald and Stew. It was created in collaboration with director Annie Dorsen.
Signature Theatre Company is an American theatre based in Manhattan, New York. It was founded in 1991 by James Houghton and is now led by Artistic Director Emily Shooltz. Signature is known for their season-long focus on one artist's work. It has been located in the Pershing Square Signature Center since 2012.
Israel Theo Hicks was an American theatre director who produced works at regional theaters around the country and Off Broadway, and was best known for his stagings of the entire series of plays by August Wilson about the African-American experience in the U.S. during and following the Great Migration.
Floyd Lee, also known as Theodore Williams, was an American blues musician. A native of Mississippi, Lee traveled around the United States before settling in New York City in 1972. He is best known for his passionate performances of blues music in and around New York's subway stations for almost 30 years, before recording four albums on the Amogla Records label and touring in his later years. "Mean Blues" became one of his more popular numbers.
