The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin (New Theater Wing)
- Book, Music & Lyrics by Kirsten Childs
- Directed by Wilfredo Medina
Playwrights Horizons: The Bubbly Black Girl Sheds Her Chameleon Skin. Her other musicals include Miracle Brothers (Vineyard Theatre), Fly (with Rajiv Joseph and Bill Sherman), and Funked Up Fairy Tales. For her work she has received Obie, Kleban, Larson, Richard Rodgers, Audelco, and Gilman/Gonzalez-Falla awards, as well as Lortel and Drama Desk nominations. She recently collaborated with Charlayne Woodard on the musical Grace for Inner Voices: Solo Musicals. Kirsten has written for Disney Theatricals, the American Songbook series at Lincoln Center, the New Electric Company, Works and Process at the Guggenheim Museum and City Center Encores! She is a professor in NYU’s Graduate Musical Theater Writing Program, a member of both the Dramatists Guild Council and the Dramatists Guild Fund, and is proud to be a mentor in Theatre Development Fund’s Open Doors program.
(as of 4/4/17)
Photo by Zack DeZon
has directed Bubbly through its various stages at Dixon Place, the O'Neill Festival, MTC and its workshop last year here at Playwrights. He spent 12 years as Co-Artistic Director of the Family Life Theatre and Consulting Director of NiteStar, both interactive, socio-dramatic theater companies. For TV, he most recently collaborated on the writing and direction of the 1999 Emmy-award winning "Talking Back" for ABC-TV, as well as directing segments of the ABC-TV live national special, "Peter Jennings...Answering Children's Questions," the Emmy nominated "Love, Peace, Predjudice, Hate," for PBS, the ABC Afterschool Special "Makin' It" and "Justice Factory" for Court TV.
What’s a Black girl from sunny Southern California to do? White people are blowing up Black girls in Birmingham churches. Black people are shouting “Black is beautiful” while straightening their hair and coveting light skin. Viveca Stanton’s answer: Slap on a bubbly smile and be as white as you can be! In a humorous and pointed coming-of-age story spanning the 60s through the 90s, Viveca blithely sails through the confusing worlds of racism, sexism, and Broadway showbiz until she’s forced to face the devastating effects of self-denial.
Featuring
Cheryl Alexander
Natalie Venetia Belcon
Duane Boutte
Angel Desai
Kena Tangi Dorsey
Linda Dorsey
Keith Lee Grant
James Ludwig
Kevyn Morrow
James Rich
Darcie Roberts