Displaying items by tag: Congo Square

Founded in 1999, Congo Square Theatre Company (Congo Square), one of the nation's premier African American ensemble theater companies, celebrates its 25^th Anniversary in 2023-2024 with a powerful theatrical season honoring the myriad experiences that make up Black culture. Anchored by two live performances, the season begins with the Rolling World Premiere of Inda Craig-Galván's dark comedy about housing inequality in a Chicago suburb, WELCOME TO MATTESON!, and closes with the Chicago Premiere of August Wilson's autobiographical one-man show, How I Learned What I Learned, starring Chicago's own Harry Lennix. Congo Square's popular digital shows continue with the third and final season of the old-fashioned radio melodrama, The Clinic, and the fourth season of the hit online sketch comedy show, The Blackside. Congo Square will officially celebrate its milestone anniversary with a bigger-than-ever 25^th Anniversary Homecoming celebration and its annual free Festival on the Square.

This season, Congo Square continues its Radical Generosity model for live performances in which, partnering with community organizations throughout the city, up to half of all tickets for each performance are donated or heavily discounted to traditionally underserved groups. To learn more about discounted community partner tickets, or to become a sponsor, email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

"We are thrilled to be celebrating our 25^th Anniversary with a diverse season that is packed with talent," said Congo Square Artistic Director Ericka Ratcliff. "At Congo Square, we are focused on three things: radical generosity, radical community, and radical expansion. As we've done since 1999, we will continue to uplift, support, and expand our community of artists and audience members through innovation and collaboration this season and for the next 25 years."

"We are also looking back at our roots this season," added Congo Square Executive Director Charlique C. Rolle. "August Wilson was not only one of America's most beloved playwrights, he was also one of Congo Square's earliest supporters and mentors. We are proud to honor this impactful early relationship in Congo's history with a production of Wilson's memory play, How I Learned What I Learned, starring Congo Square Board member, the great Harry Lennix. The play will be produced in association with the Goodman Theatre, the first theater in the country to have produced every play in Wilson's American Century cycle. As we look back, we also look forward to Congo Square's future as we continue to build meaningful relationships with the best Black theater-makers in Chicago and the world."

2023-24 Programming in chronological order

The Clinic: Season Three

September 1 – October 6, 2023

Audio series

Congo Square's audio series returns for a third and final season starting September 1 with new episodes dropping weekly until the dramatic series finale on October 6.  In the old-school radio melodrama, The Clinic, Dr. Latisha Bradley's discovery will revolutionize the medical field, but her enemies will stop at nothing to keep things the way they are. Episodes will be released at congosquaretheatre.org/the-clinic. Seasons one and two are available for streaming now.

Rolling World Premiere: WELCOME TO MATTESON!

September 10 – October 1, 2023 (opening night September 29)

Northwestern University Chicago Campus Abbott Hall Wirtz Theatre, 710 N DuSable Lake Shore Dr.

A dark comedy by Inda Craig-Galván, WELCOME TO MATTESON! follows two Black couples over the course of a dinner party; one couple has lived in the Chicago suburb of Matteson for years, the other has just moved in after being forcibly relocated from the Cabrini-Green housing projects. A uniquely Chicago story, the play explores universal themes of gentrification, housing justice, and inter-class relationships. Directed by Congo Square Theatre Artistic Director Ericka Ratcliff, the play features Congo Square Ensemble Members Ronald L. Conner,  Anthony L. Irons, and  Alexis J. Roston. Congo Square's production of WELCOME TO MATTESON! is part of the National New Play Network's Rolling World Premiere program in which a new play will be premiered by multiple companies over an 18-month period allowing the playwright to collaborate and make adjustments while working with unique perspectives from each company. WELCOME TO MATTESON! will receive its World Premiere at New Jersey Repertory Company, Long Branch, New Jersey (SuzAnne Barabas, Artistic Director; Gabor Barabas, Executive Producer).  Tickets for WELCOME TO MATTESON! will go on sale August 1, 2023. General admission tickets are $45 and Radical Generosity tickets are $75 - covering the cost of a single ticket and sponsoring a second community member ticket. For tickets, visit congosquaretheatre.org

Pearl Cleage Festival: Angry, Raucous, and Shamelessly Gorgeous

October 8, 2023

Location to be announced

The Pearl Cleage Festival is a citywide celebration honoring the work of Atlanta's Poet Laureate, revered poet, activist, playwright, mentor, and educator Pearl Cleage. Festival events will take place across the city in September and October during the run of Cleage's Nacirema Society at the Goodman Theatre. In addition to Congo Square, other participating companies include Black Ensemble Theater, Definition Theatre, ETA Creative Arts Foundation, Ma'at Production Association of Afrikan Centered Theatre (MPAACT), and Remy Bumppo Theatre Company. Congo Square's contribution to the festival is a reading of Cleage's 2019 comedy Angry, Raucous, and Shamelessly Gorgeous. In Angry, Raucous, and Shamelessly Gorgeous, two Black women performers from two different generations must confront assumptions about each other and themselves in time for opening night.

The Blackside: Season Four

October 13 – December 9, 2023

Digital video series

Congo Square's popular online sketch comedy series, The Blackside (formerly Hit 'em on the Blackside), returns for a fourth season this fall. Audiences can expect more of the witty, pitch-perfect, and timely humor that made sketches from the first three seasons like "Black History Game Show" and "Black Survivalist" so funny and poignant.  Episodes will be released weekly on Congo Square Theatre's website, social media, and YouTube channel starting October 13 with the final episode airing on December 9. The first three seasons of The Blackside are available on Congo Square's YouTube channel.

Chicago Premiere: How I Learned What I Learned

Spring 2024

Location to be announced

August Wilson's autobiographical play, How I Learned What I Learned, follows Wilson's journey as a young Black writer from Pittsburgh to one of the most celebrated American playwrights of the 20^th century. Written three years before his death, the one-man show recounts numerous stories from the author's long career and the lessons they taught about what it means to be a Black artist in America. Congo Square Board Member, and star of stage and screen, Harry Lennix will perform the play. Most recently, Lennix has been seen as Harold Cooper on NBC's acclaimed series Blacklist, and as General Swanwick/Martian Manhunter in numerous films and TV shows in the DC Extended Universe.  How I Learned What I Learned is produced in association with the Goodman Theatre and runs concurrently with Goodman's production of August Wilson's Joe Turner's Come and Gone.

25^th Anniversary Homecoming

June 21, 2024

Location to be announced

Congo Square's annual Homecoming benefit is the not-to-be-missed party of the season. In celebration of 25 years of unapologetic Black theater-making, the 2024 Homecoming benefit promises to be even bigger, Blacker, and more bodacious than ever before. Featuring food and drink, live entertainment, and one of the biggest gatherings of Chicago's Black theater artists, the evening will also include an awards ceremony honoring three artists who've impacted Chicago's theater scene.

Festival on the Square

June 2024

Various locations to be announced

Congo Square's annual Festival on the Square honors the original Congo Square marketplace in New Orleans, where people of color have built community through music, dance, art, and commerce for centuries. These FREE events feature elevated play readings – including readings from plays by the outgoing and incoming Next Up Fellows – performed in community hubs across the city.

Congo Square Industry Training Institute

Congo Square's ensemble-led Congo Square Industry Training Institute (CITI) workshops are affordable classes designed for working and aspiring artists to enhance their knowledge of the industry as well as their acting skills. Upcoming courses include Self-Tape for the Working Actor with Tracey N. Bonner; My Big Break: Breaking into the Industry with Javon Johnson; How to Write for TV/Film with Javon Johnson; Secure the Bag: Grant Writing for Individual Artists with Ann J. Douglas; Classical Interpretation with Allen Gilmore and Classical (Re)interpretation with Al Goldfarb. Each four-week workshop is $50.00 for the general public, and free for currently enrolled high school, college, or graduate school students.

About Congo Square Theatre Company

Congo Square Theatre Company is an ensemble dedicated to producing transformative work rooted in the African Diaspora. Congo Square is a haven for artists of color to challenge and redefine the theatrical canon by amplifying and creating stories that reflect the reach and complexities of Black Culture and is one of only two African American Actors' Equity theater companies in Chicago. Founded in 1999 with a mission to provide a platform for Black artists to present work that exemplified the majesty, diversity, and intersectionality of stories from the African Diaspora, Congo Square's guiding principles are radical generosity, radical community, and radical expansion.

Congo Square has risen to become one of the most well-respected African American theaters in the nation. Previously mentored by two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson, Congo Square's August Wilson New Play Initiative has cultivated talents such as playwright Chadwick Boseman (Marvel Studio's Black Panther), who penned the 2006 Jeff nominated play Deep Azure, Lisa Langford who's play How Blood Go was premiered by Congo Square in 2023, and playwright Lydia Diamond, who penned the massively successful Stick Fly, a critically acclaimed play that explores race, class, and familial friction. Stick Fly ultimately ran on Broadway and is currently being developed into a full-length series for HBO with Alicia Keys serving as a producer. Congo Square also produced the widely praised Seven Guitars, which won top honors for best ensemble, best direction, and best production at the 2005 Joseph Jefferson Awards. This would earn the theater company the distinction of being the first African American theater company to receive such an honor.

Congo Square's Samuel G. Roberson Next Up Fellowship celebrates young playwrights by providing resources for college and high school aged students to enhance their writing and identity as a playwright. Each selected fellow not only has their ten-minute play workshopped into a full-length play with Congo Square, but they also receive a yearlong writing mentorship with founding ensemble member and playwright, Aaron Todd Douglas. The 2023-24 Fellow is Maria D. Smith. Outgoing 2022-23 Next Up Fellows are Helaina Coggs and Bair Warburton-Brown.

Congo Square's Community Engagement and Education programs bring the impact of theater to young audiences. Its outreach programs, CORE (Curriculum Objectives Residency Enrichment), and CAST (Congo After School Theater), present and teach theater arts by providing classroom and after-school residencies that provide Teaching Artists to build upon already established Chicago Public Schools literature and art curriculums. CORE and CAST impact students, schools, and community organizations located on the South and West sides of Chicago.

About Goodman Theatre

Chicago's theater since 1925, Goodman Theatre (Artistic Director Susan V. Booth and Executive Director/CEO Roche Schulfer) is a not-for-profit arts and community organization in the heart of the Loop, distinguished by the excellence and scope of its artistic programming and community engagement. The theater's artistic priorities include new play development (more than 150 world or American premieres), large scale musical theater works and reimagined classics. Artists and productions have earned two Pulitzer Prizes, 22 Tony Awards and more than 160 Jeff Awards, among other accolades. Its longtime annual holiday tradition A Christmas Carol, now in its fifth decade, has created a new generation of theatergoers in Chicago. The Goodman also frequently serves as a production and program partner with national and international companies and Chicago's Off-Loop theaters. Using the tools of the theatrical profession, the Goodman's Education and Engagement programs aim to develop generations of citizens who understand the cultures and stories of diverse voices.

For more information on Congo Square's 2023-24 Season, visit www.congosquaretheatre.org.