WATCH NIGHT At The Perelman Performing Arts Center Opens Tomorrow

The Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC, Executive Director Khady Kamara and Artistic Director Bill Rauch) presents Watch Night at the new performing arts center at the World Trade Center site in Lower Manhattan.  The production opens tomorrow, November 8, 2023.

 

A PAC NYC commission, this world premiere is a genre-defying exploration of justice and forgiveness that fuses melodies rooted in spirituals, percussive breath, and fiery opera with the urgency of slam poetry. The creative team for Watch Night features Bill T. Jones as the co-conceiver, director and choreographer, Marc Bamuthi Joseph as co-conceiver and librettist, Tamar-kali as composer, and Lauren Whitehead as dramaturg.  The production runs through November 18 at PAC NYC.

 

Brandon Michael Nase and Danyel Fulton lead the company, which features Ken Alston Jr., Amanda Bailey, Royer Bockus, DeJa-Simone Crumpton, Kevin Csolak, Sola Fadiran, Danyel Fulton, Brian Golub, Chelsea Nicole Green, Raquel Jennings, Damon McToy, Brandon Michael Nase, Josette Elaine Newsam, Ariel Neydavoud, Onyie Nwachukwu, Jill Paice, Oneika Phillips, Devin L. Roberts, Arri Lawton Simon, Jonathan McClinton Smith, Cooper Stanton, and Miguel Ángel Vásquez. 

 

Post show conversations are planned on November 9, with Bill T. Jones, Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Tamar-kali, and Lauren Whitehead, moderated by Watch Night's Rabbinical Consultant, Kendell Pinkney and on November 12, with Bill T. Jones and faith leaders, invited by PAC NYC's anchor alliance partner, the Interfaith Center of New York.

 

Watch Night features scenic design by Adam Rigg, costume design by Kara Harmon, lighting design by Robert Wierzel, sound design by Mikaal Sulaiman, projection design by Lucy Mackinnon, and wig design by Anika Seitu. The production's Music Director is Adam Rothenberg. The Production Stage Manager is Sarah Elizabeth Ford. Casting is by The Telsey Office/Destiny Lilly CSA.

Tickets are on sale now at PACNYC.org. 

PAC NYC (251 Fulton Street) is a dynamic new home for the performing arts, serving audiences and the creative sector through flexible venues that embrace wide-ranging artistic programs. The inaugural season features work across theater, dance, music, opera, film and more.

Ken Alston Jr. (Super/Natural) is an accomplished and world-recognized vocal performer. He has an extensive range which has led him to opportunities with Three Mo' Tenors, Lyric Opera of Chicago, Opera Philadelphia, and to orchestral work with the Czech, Charleston, Baltimore and Soulful Symphony Orchestras. A graduate of Morgan State University and holds membership in Phi Mu Alpha Sinfonia, and Alpha Phi Alpha. @KenAlstonJr

Amanda Bailey (Echo Chamber; Shayla/Ms Laura u/s). Theater: Marley in Escape to Margaritaville (Engeman Theater); Newsies; The Bridge; Amadeus (Folger Theater); Caroline, or Change (APAC); Superfly, the Musical (Workshop); Taming of the Shrew (STNJ); The Color Purple (National Tour). Film: I Won The Lottery (Cannes 2022 Short Film Corner). TV: Law and Order: SVU, Bronx'ish, and Power Book 3: Raising Kanan. Thanks to God, her manager Susan Campochiaro Confrey, and agent JC William Agency. 

Royer Bockus (Echo Chamber; Ms. Summers u/s). In six seasons at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival: A Midsummer Night's Dream, All's Well that Ends Well, Oklahoma!, Into the Woods, The Taming of the Shrew, Love's Labor's Lost, Revenge Song and others. Off-Broadway: The Knight of the Burning Pestle (Red Bull/Fiasco). Regional: Trinity Repertory Company, Wallis Annenberg Center, Lookingglass Theater, Jungle Theater. Co-founder of Ring of Keys www.ringofkeys.org. Love to Mom, Dad, and Jackson.

DeJa-Simone Crumpton (Echo Chamber u/s) is elated to make her Off-Broadway debut at PAC! After graduating from Florida State University with a BFA in musical theater, she toured with the First National tour of Summer: The Donna Summer Musical and the first national tour of The Lincoln Center Theater production of Lerner and Loewe's My Fair Lady. Regional credits include In the Heights, Aida, Hairspray, and many more. All gratitude and love to The Crumpton's and TPG Agency! IG: @dejacrumpton

Kevin Csolak (The Wolf) is an actor, dancer, and singer.  He starred in Steven Spielberg's West Side Story and Henry Alex Rubin's Disconnect. Broadway: West Side Story (A-Rab), Mean Girls, How The Grinch Stole Christmas, Cirque Du Soliel's WINTUK. Regional: world premieres of Mean Girls and The Prom. TV: TNT's Animal Kingdom (Young Pope) and performed in Justin Timberlake's Pepsi SuperBowl 52 Halftime Show with Doja Cat. Gratitude to Buchwald and Untitled Entertainment. Love to Mom, Dad, brothers and family.

Sola Fadiran (Winters). Broadway: Camelot. Regional: Good Faith (Yale Repertory Theater); Twelfth Night, Alice Yell, Bodas De Sangre, Reykjavik (Yale School of Drama); La Boheme; Song From the Uproar (Cincinnati Opera); Porgy and Bess, Ragtime (Utah Festival Opera); In the Land of Uz (national premiere, Yale Schola Cantorum). Soloist in concert: Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Kentucky Symphony Orchestra, Columbia Orchestra, Orchestra New England, Teatro Isauro Martínez de México. MFA, Yale School of Drama.

Danyel Fulton (Shayla) is a Brooklyn-born and bred actor/singer. Favorite credits: Actor 3 (Plays for the Plague Year, The Public), Ruby (Broadbend, Arkansas, Transport Group), U/S Rosalind (As You Like It, Public Works), Dorothy (The Wiz, The Muny) Dionne (Hair, 2nd National Tour), Aisha (A Time to Love, National Black Theater), and Sarah (Ragtime, The 5th, Asolo Rep, TUTS) Drama League, Antonyo, and Audelco Award nominations for Ruby. www.danyelfulton.com 

Brian Golub (Rabine). Film: When in Rome (w/ Kristen Bell). Tours: Jesus Christ Superstar, School of Rock, Joseph…Dreamcoat, Jekyll & Hyde (South Korea). Recording: Hair (Actors' Fund; Grammy Nominated). Carbonell Award Winner, Best Actor: Memphis (Huey) and Best Supporting nominee: Fiddler (Motel), Full Monty (Malcolm). Connecticut Critics Circle Best Actor nominee: Secret Garden (Archie). Zonie Best Supporting nominee: Altar Boyz (Abe). BrianGolub.com. Owner of UncleBrianWellness.com. Thanks Avalon Artists Group and Destiny! Namaste Y'all. @Brigolub @unclebrianwellness

Chelsea Nicole Green (Echo Chamber) acquired her Bachelor of Arts Degree in Dance from UMBC. Professional accomplishments include performances with Baltimore Dance Project, Deep Vision Dance Company, Deviated Theatre, ClancyWorks Dance Company, and Disney Cruise Line where she was the dance captain and a main stage performer for four years. She was seen most recently at The Fireside Theatre as Jan in the musical Grease! You can follow her @leaptotherhythm across all platforms.

Raquel Jennings (Super/Natural u/s) is beyond excited to be a part of the inaugural season here at PAC! Regional: FELA! (Olney Theatre Center), Shout Sister Shout, Grace (Ford's Theatre), The Day You Begin (The Kennedy Center TYA), The Color Purple (Signature), Dreamgirls (Baltimore Center Stage). Other: The Last 5 Years, Ragtime (Seacoast Rep). Raquel received her B.A. and M.A. in Voice at Morgan State University. Much thanks to God, her family and her agency FSE Talent. IG: @raqui_j

Damon McToy (Josh/Saul u/s) is a AEA member and thrilled to be a part of the inaugural season here at the new PAC. Regional Credits: Jekyll and Hyde The Musical (Gretna Theater), RENT (San Antonio Public), Les Misérables (The Fulton Theater). International Tours: Sister Act The Musical. Damon would like to thank his family for their constant support and also his agency, Hudson Artist Agency. You can follow him on Instagram @mctoystoryy

Brandon Michael Nase he/him (Josh) hopes you will pour into the work being done to provide solutions by engaging with, supporting, and activating around organizations involved in change work, including but not limited to NY-based organizations The Brotherhood Sister Sol and I Will Graduate. Immense gratitude to Gregg Baker and the entire GBM family, Bill T. Jones, Tamar-kali, Marc Bamuthi Joseph, Lauren Whitehead, and my Anaya and Ellis. www.brandonmichaelnase.com @brandonmichaelnase

Josette Elaine Newsam (Ms. Laura) has performed on The Today Show, Live with Regis and Kelly, and Live with Kelly and Michael. Other work includes voice-overs and vocals, recording with Dr. Bernice Johnson Reagon, Toshi Reagon, Melba Moore, Lou Reed, Macy Gray, and Angelique Kidjo, Billy Bragg, Norm Lewis, and Ben E. King. Musicals credits: Ain't Misbehavin' (Nell), Ragtime (Sarah), Gustave Flaubert's The Temptation of St. Anthony (Chorus), Zinnias (Mama), Parable of the Sower” (Mrs. Simms), and Big Lovely.

Ariel Neydavoud (Echo Chamber; Rabine u/s) was most recently in Center Theatre Group's production of The Secret Garden. He starred in Kismet directed by Lonny Price and appeared in The Visitor at The Public Theatre opposite David Hyde Pearce. Other selected credits: Prospect Theatre Company, NYMF, Two River Theatre, Perelman PAC, Marriott Theatre, Maltz Jupiter Theatre, ACT of CT, Reprise! 2.0, Transcendence Theatre Company, Tuacahn Center for the Arts, Musical Theatre West, 3-D Theatricals. Instagram/TikTok: @arielneydavoud

Onyie Nwachukwu (Super/Natural) is thrilled to be a part of such a phenomenal and important work at PAC. She feels truly blessed and thanks God! Previous work includes Heather Christian's Oratorio For Living Things at Ars Nova (Lucille Lortel Award winner) and the Jeremy O. Harris world premiere of Daddy at Signature Theatre. After years of workshops and exploration she is so grateful to get to finally share Watch Night with audiences! YT/IG: Onyie Sings! 

Jill Paice (Ms. Summers). Broadway credits include: An American in Paris, Matilda, The 39 Steps, Curtains, and The Woman in White. West End: Scarlet in Gone with the Wind and The Woman in White. Off-Broadway: Jerry Springer: the Opera, Death Takes a Holiday (Roundabout), Company (NY Philharmonic), and Where's Charley (Encores!). Other theatre credits: Sophie in Mamma Mia (Vegas), Les Misérables (National Tour), and Chess (Signature, Helen Hayes Award nom).  TV: NCIS: New Orleans, Unforgettable, Person of Interest, White Collar.

Oneika Phillips (Echo Chamber). First Grenadian woman on Broadway and proud Caribbean Ambassador. Broadway: 1776, FELA!, Spongebob Squarepants, Violet (Asst. to Choreographer), Amazing Grace. Off-Broadway: TNG/Signature Theatre's Black No More. National/International Tours: 1776, West Side Story (50th Anniversary World Tour), FELA! New York: Christopher Gattelli's In Your Arms, Jermaine Rowe's Standpipe and Children from the Blue Mountains, Leonora—a Caribbean interpretation of Ibsen's A Doll's House. Abdel Salaam's Forces of Nature Dance Theatre. Follow her journey! IG: @DragonPassionFruit.

Devin L. Roberts (Echo Chamber). Dance Companies: The Philadelphia Dance Company (Philadanco!) Broadway: The Lion King (Minskoff Theatre), The Life (City Center Encores). Off Broadway: Venice (The Public Theater). Regional: RENT (Oregon Shakespeare Festival), Beetlejuice (National Theatre), In The Heights (Dallas Theater Center), Ain't Too Proud (Berkeley Repertory Theatre), Smokey Joe's Cafe (Theatre Under The Stars). TV: America's Got Talent (BGVs for Jonah Smith). Grateful to God and The Ancestors for the gift of art. 

Arri Lawton Simon (Saul) is an award-winning writer, performer, and educator based in NYC. He is faculty at Professional Performing Arts/Rosie's Theater Kids and maintains a private voice studio. Arri serves on the steering committee of the BMI Musical Theatre Workshops and has lectured on dramatic writing at universities and conferences across the country. Performance highlights include NY City Center Encores, Carnegie Hall, and Lincoln Center. AEA, BMI, Dramatists Guild, ASCAP. www.mcguireandsimon.com

Jonathan McClinton Smith (Echo Chamber) has danced with Step Afrika!, The 7 Fingers, Telemundo, Cirque du Soleil's Cirque Dreams, Les Farfadais, and many more. Jonathan was most recently seen in the world premiere of Malvolio (Classical Theatre of Harlem). Career highlights include premiering two new works of longtime mentor and collaborator, Terrance Henderson without whom, none of this would be possible, The Black Man…Complex and RUINS (part of the Incubator Series at Harbison Theater). For you, Dad. IG: @jonathannsmith

Cooper Stanton (Echo Chamber/Wolf u/s) is a multi-disciplinary performer hailing from Massachusetts. His artistic pursuits are driven by a strong desire to uplift and unite through shared experiences and the celebration of love! Credits include: 50th anniversary tour of Jesus Christ Superstar; MUNY: Seven Brides for Seven Brothers, Paint Your Wagon, Cinderella; TUTS: Jerome Robbins' Broadway. Graduate of The National Circus School (Montreal). Love and gratitude to mom, dad, Adam, Tyler, Jahna, and Rider!

Miguel Ángel Vásquez (Echo Chamber; Winters u/s). An Afro-latino baritone lionized for his “golden voice,” Vásquez recently appeared in Evita at the American Repertory Theater. Highlights: soloing at Carnegie Hall, Stonewall the Opera at Jazz at Lincoln Center (NYC Opera), and the Grammy nominated recording of X: The Life and Times of Malcolm X by Anthony Davis (BMOP, Odyssey Opera). Favorite roles: Beast in Beauty and the Beast, Coalhouse in Ragtime, Jake in Side Show, and Cinderella's Prince/the Wolf in Into the Woods. MiguelAngelVasquez.com @mv080.

Bill T. Jones (Co-Conceiver, Director, and Choreographer). Founding Artistic Director: New York Live Arts, an organization that supports body/movement-based artists through producing, presenting, and educating. Awards: National Medal of Arts (2013); Kennedy Center Honors (2010); Doris Duke Performing Artist Award (2014); Tony Award for Best Choreography FELA! (2010); 2007 Tony and Obie Awards for Spring Awakening; Jacob's Pillow Dance Award (2010); USA Eileen Harris Norton Fellowship (2007); Wexner Prize (2005); Samuel H. Scripps American Dance Festival Award for Lifetime Achievement (2005); Harlem Renaissance Award (2005); Dorothy and Lillian Gish Prize (2003); and the MacArthur “Genius” Award (1994), Officier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (2010 ) by the French government and the Dance Heritage Coalition named him “an irreplaceable dance treasure.” Jones choreographed and performed worldwide with his late partner, Zane. They formed the Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company in 1982 for which he created more than 140 works.  

Marc Bamuthi Joseph (Co-Conceiver, Librettist) is a 2017 TED Global Fellow, an inaugural recipient of the Guggenheim Social Practice initiative, and an honoree of the United States Artists Rockefeller Fellowship. He is also the winner of the 2011 Herb Alpert Award in Theatre, and an inaugural recipient of the Doris Duke Performing Artist Award. Bamuthi has most recently completed commissions for Yale University, the Albany Symphony Orchestra, The Minnesota Orchestra, The New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, and the Washington National Opera. His collaboration with NYC Ballet Associate Artistic Director Wendy Whelan is set to premiere in 2024 at the Meany Center at the University of Washington. A proud alumnus of Morehouse College, Bamuthi is the recipient of Honorary Doctorates of Fine Arts from both the California College of Arts and Middlebury College. He currently serves as the Vice President of Social Impact and Artistic Director of Cultural Strategy at The Kennedy Center.

Tamar-kali (Composer). Brooklyn born and bred artist Tamar-kali is a second-generation musician with roots in the coastal Sea Islands of South Carolina. As a composer, Tamar-kali has defied boundaries to craft her own unique alternative sound. As a performer, Tamar-kali speaks her lyrical truth with a supreme passion and a voice that will shake your foundation and shatter your expectations with its soulful intensity. The pieces she composes and arranges for her string sextet and voice project: Psychochamber Ensemble, marries the classical music of her Catholic upbringing with post-punk sensibilities. 2017 marked her debut as a film score composer with Dee Rees' Oscar-nominated “Mudbound”.  Her ‘expressive and varied score' [Variety] garnered her the World Soundtrack Academy's 2018 Discovery of the Year Award and has been classified by Indiewire as one of the 25 Best Film Scores of the 21st Century. The soundtrack for her score to Josephine Decker's psychological drama ‘SHIRLEY' was named The Guardian's Contemporary Album of the month in June 2020. 2022 saw her debut work from multiple commissions; the LA Opera digital short, We Hold These Truths' directed by Peabody award winner dream hampton, a solo cello piece ‘Little Bear Awakens' for acclaimed cellist Matt Haimovitz' Primavera Project alongside composers Josqin des Prez and Philip Glass as well as a return to the stage to perform ‘Melancholy Ghosts and Other Mothers' a Beth Morrison Projects commissioned song cycle. 2023 heralded the release of the Catapult Opera digital short, ‘SWANN' in homage to William Dorsey Swann the first American on record to pursue legal and political action to defend the LGBTQIA community's right to gather. Freedom is a Constant Struggle, a concert curated and co-produced by the artist and presented by Lincoln Center featured Sea Island Symphony: Red Rice, Cotton and Indigo; an orchestral love letter to her Gullah Geechee roots. Watch Night, a theatrical work conceived and directed by Bill T. Jones and composed by Tamar-kali with a libretto by Marc Bamuthi Joseph will make its world premiere in November 2023 as part of the long-awaited Perelman Performing Arts Center's inaugural season.

Lauren Whitehead (Dramaturg) is a writer, performer and dramaturg. She writes in several forms including poetry, adaptations and drama. Her poems have been published in POETRY magazine and Apogee Journal as well as in selected anthologies such as Break Beat Poets, Vol. 2: Black Girl Magic and What Things Cost, the first anthology of labor writing in nearly a century. Whitehead adapted the text of Ta-Nehisi Coates' award winning memoir, Between the World and Me, for staging at the Apollo Theater, the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, and for the TV adaptation on HBO. In 2022, Whitehead was a finalist for The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. In her most recent performance, she originated the lead role of “Un/Sung” in We Shall Not Be Moved, which she performed at the Wilma Theater and the Stadsschouwburg Theater in Amsterdam. Currently, she is a Professor of Drama at NYU Tisch School of the Arts.

About PAC NYC

The inaugural season showcases the unparalleled flexibility of three performing arts venues inside PAC NYC: the John E. Zuccotti Theater (seating up to 450 people), the Mike Nichols Theater (seating up to 250) and the Doris Duke Foundation Theater (seating up to 99). These venues can recombine in over 60 configurations with capacities ranging from 50 to 1080 seats.  Mechanical systems allow the floors to be raked or flat; staging options include proscenium and thrust; and seating, lighting grids and acoustical systems can accommodate each layout for artistic innovation that can engage and delight audiences in new ways at every visit.

Named for businessman, philanthropist and benefactor Ronald O. Perelman, the Perelman Performing Arts Center is 129,000 square feet, rising 138 feet from street level.  Its cube-shaped exterior is wrapped in glass-covered Portuguese marble tiles, arranged in a book-matched pattern that radiates from the center of each façade.  The tiles, less than half an inch thick, allow light to radiate in during the day, and glow out during the evening.  Designed by the architecture firm REX, led by founding principal Joshua Ramus, the building was created in collaboration with executive architect Davis Brody Bond, theater consultant Charcoalblue and acoustician Threshold Acoustics.  David Rockwell and his architecture and design firm Rockwell Group designed the interior of the lobby and restaurant with a dynamic ceiling visible from the street to create an inviting entry experience. The lobby's restaurant by chef Marcus Samuelsson, along with the bar and outdoor terrace, will offer a new gathering space for the Lower Manhattan community.

PAC NYC Memberships starting at $10 for the inaugural season are available. Members are provided early access to purchase tickets and other perks. For more information or to learn how to support PAC NYC, visit PACNYC.org.

Tickets start at $39 and are available online at PACNYC.org or by calling 212.266.3000.  All performances are at 251 Fulton Street.

The public can sign up for important updates from PAC NYC at PACNYC.org/sign-up.

Citi is the official card and a proud sponsor of PAC NYC.

PAC NYC is grateful for the support of Bloomberg Philanthropies

PAC NYC is committed to providing an enjoyable and inclusive experience for all patrons and ensuring that all audiences have access to our programs and performances. PAC NYC meets or exceeds the standards set by the Americans with Disabilities Act. The ADA Entrance at PAC NYC is sponsored by Citi. For more information on accessibility, please visit PACNYC.org/accessibility.

Information provided is accurate at the time of printing but is subject to change.