The Mission
Broadway & Beyond: Access for Stage Managers of Color provides opportunities to aspiring and current stage managers of color to learn from industry insiders, meet industry leaders, and provide insights to help stage managers of color start, maintain, and advance a career in the arts and theatre through free networking and educational events.
Broadway & Beyond offers direct access to the industry professionals responsible for filling stage management positions in New York, on tour, and in regional theaters throughout the country. We aim to eliminate the phrase ‘I don’t know where to find them’ from the hiring process and create opportunities for stage managers of color who are ready to work.
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Contact Us for more information on how you can be involved.
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Upcoming Networking Event:
Monday, September 18, 2023
Hybrid Event is both in person in NYC and Online
Broadway & Beyond: Access for Stage Managers of Color will host a hybrid networking event (virtual and in-person) in New York City on Monday, September 18, 2023, continuing its mission to provide opportunity, education and vital industry connections for stage managers of color.
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The event will take place on Monday, September 18 from 10:30am-6:00pm at Ripley-Grier Studios (520 8th Avenue). Stage managers who wish to join the nextworking event need to apply with the button below. The deadline is Friday, August 25 at 11:59pm EST.
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Theater industry professionals interested in participating in the event should register at the button below. Registraion is necessary for both in person or virtual. The deadline is Friday, August 25 at 11:59pm EST.
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Since its founding in December 2020, Broadway & Beyond: Access for Stage Managers of Color has hosted four networking events and multiple educational seminars. Broadway & Beyond’s previous networking events have included over 40 theater industry professionals representing Broadway, Off-Broadway, touring, regional theater, opera, cruise lines, special events and choreographers, including: RCI Theatricals, Disney Theatrical Productions, Bespoke Theatricals, Foresight Theatrical, Wagner Johnson Productions, Joey Parnes Productions, Classic Stage Company, Playwrights Horizons, Manhattan Theatre Club, Goodman Theatre, The MUNY, Paper Mill Playhouse, Goodspeed Musicals, Work Light Productions, Maybury Webb Creative, Theater Works USA, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Production Glue and many more.
What People Are Saying
I must say in all honesty, that my inbox has never had this much activity and I have you three to thank.
It's been a while since I have been on Broadway and now it's in my future.
And I can't remember when I have had to say "No" to more than one project.
A hundred million thanks for what you all have done.
BERNITA ROBINSON
I am an early career stage manager that just graduated with my MFA in stage management. After attending your second round of zoom networking events, I'm happy to let you know that I have been hired as an Assistant Stage Manager....
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I am so grateful for this opportunity, and I know it would not have been possible without the incredible work you all have put into Broadway Beyond Access. Thank you for seeing us and helping others see us too.
KAYLA URIBE
Thank you all for your leadership and effort put forth into this organization. I've been able to connect with people I'd have never thought possible. Doors continue to open
I want to first say thank you all for creating Broadway & Beyond, it has been a blessing having a space created that I can see other stage managers in all different points in their careers that look like me. Thank you thank you thank you for creating this space, I look forward to more events with you all.
TONY H. HARRIS II
JANETTE BRAGGS
Educational Event:
Held Tuesday, April 5th, 2022 - Free Replay Below
The Stage Manager’s Role in Building an Equitable and Compassionate Production Culture
Broadway & Beyond: Access for Stage Managers of Color welcomes veteran stage managers and professors Narda E. Alcorn and Lisa Porter for a webinar on anti-racist and anti-oppressive stage management practices. Webinar includes ASL interpretation.
The webinar will focus on tools that enable stage managers to build an equitable and compassionate workspace and will promote transparency, equity and inclusion as community-wide practices that can be exercised by everyone involved in a production. Alcorn and Porter will discuss how to effectively collaborate with producers, general managers and anyone who holds positional authority within an organization. They will speak from their social identities, mid-career women—one Black, and one White—who are educators and stage managers, spouses, parents and leaders in the field of stage management.
This event was very important for our entire community; therefore, the video/replay is shared below.
About the Presenters
Professor Narda E. Alcorn (she, her, hers), Chair, Stage Management, David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University, and Professor Lisa Porter (she, her, hers), Professor, Head of Stage Management, UC San Diego, published their first book, Stage Management Theory as a Guide to Practice: Cultivating a Creative Approach, in January 2020. The book has been featured in multiple publications and they have visited more than 50 virtual spaces in the past two years to teach and present their work.
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Over the summer of 2020, Professors Alcorn and Porter co-authored the HowlRound essay We Commit to Anti-Racist Stage Management Education. This essay sparked a conversation about anti-racist stage management practices that continues on the HowlRound platform with the recent work by a collective of the next generation of stage managers: Hold, Please: Addressing Urgency and Other White Supremacist Standards in Stage Management.
Alcorn and Porter are honored to be cited in the American Theatre article Pushing Past Norms and Into Equitable Authenticity: how TGNC production and stage managers are leading the field by example, co-authored by UC San Diego MFA Stage Management Alumni Kasson Marroquin.
Other press features include the American Theatre article Managing the Stage, and Managing Expectations and on the USITT podcast, TECHnically Speaking: A Conversation on Anti-Racist Stage Management, and A Call to Diversify Those Calling the Cues, NY Times, July 5, 2021.
Professors Alcorn and Porter have been stage managers since high school and met at David Geffen School of Drama at Yale University in 1992.
You can find information regarding past events here.
If you are interested in participating as a panelist in the future, please contact us.
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​Currently Broadway & Beyond's virtual events are free to attend. Applicants must register in advance.
Participation may be capped.
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Our Supporters
BROADWAY & BEYOND
For information on the Broadway Stage Management Symposium Charlie Blackwell Scholarships, click here.
The Founders
BROADWAY & BEYOND
Access for Stage Managers of Color
Lisa Dawn Cave
Production Supervisor, Frozen, The Lion King, Aida
LISA DAWN CAVE, 2023 Tony Honors recipient for Excellence in the Theatre was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY. She attended the H.S. of Performing Arts and received her BFA in Dance from SUNY Purchase. Her professional theatre career started as a dancer/singer where she performed in Cats, Jerome
Robbins’ Broadway, the 1992 revival of Guys and Dolls, Bubblin’ Brown Sugar and Golden Boy.
After 10 years of performing on the stage, Lisa Dawn’s career transitioned to behind the scenes, where she has worked consistently for over 25 years in stage management. These credits include the Broadway productions of Frozen, Shuffle Along, Fun Home, Rocky, The Humans, Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, Bring It On, West Side Story (2009), Come Fly Away, The Color Purple, Hot Feet, The Caine Mutiny Court Martial, The Woman In White, Julius Caesar, Caroline or Change, Hollywood Arms, Into the Woods, Wild Party, Parade, Smokey Joe’s Café and the 1994 revival of Showboat.
Lisa Dawn is currently the Production Supervisor for Disney’s The Lion King and Frozen worldwide, along with the re-imagined Aida, which is currently playing in the Netherlands. In addition to her theatre credits, Lisa Dawn serves on the Board of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids. She is a founding member of Black Theatre United and has served as an elected
Councilor for Actors Equity Association for 11 years. Namaste!
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To learn more, click here for the article & podcast on ipondr about Lisa Dawn's journey.
Beverly Jenkins
Production Stage Manager, Hadestown
BEVERLY JENKINS, 2020 Tony Honors recipient for Excellence in the Theatre, has been managing Broadway productions for close to 30 years. Ms. Jenkins is the production stage manager for the TONY Award winning Best Musical Hadestown. Other shows she has worked on include A Bronx Tale, Fully Committed, Amazing Grace, Living On Love, Holler If Ya Hear Me, Machinal, Godspell, Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo, In the Heights, Shrek: The Musical, Avenue Q, Aida, Sweet Charity, Oklahoma!, The Lion King, Bring In Da Noise/ Bring In Da Funk; Miss Saigon. Off Broadway: A Bronx Tale: The Musical (Paper Mill Playhouse); Bad Jews, If There Is I Haven’t Found It Yet (both at Roundabout).
Ms. Jenkins is on the boards of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights Aids and Beyond the Stage Door, and president of D.I.V.A., Inc: The Society for Women in the Arts. She is an adjunct professor at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts and The Conservatory at Shenandoah University. She is a proud mom, wife, and Howard University graduate.
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Listen to Beverly discuss her amazing career, being a mother of 7 (Yep. 7!) and of course, B&B: Access for Stage Managers of Color on an episode of the mamastalkinloud podcast or wherever you listen to your podcasts.
Access for Stage Managers of Color
Access for Stage Managers of Color
Jimmie Lee Smith
Stage Manager, Hamilton Tour
JIMMIE LEE SMITH is currently a stage manager with Disney Theatrical Group stage managing on Aladdin The Musical. Aladdin marks Jimmie’s fourth show with Disney Theatrical. Recently Jimmie was also honored to be a part of Kenny Leon’s production of The Mountaintop with Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett. Other Broadway, pre-Broadway, and national touring credits include: The Lion King, Mary Poppins, The Little Mermaid, Saturday Night Fever, Jekyll & Hyde, Evita, and Jesus Christ Superstar.
Jimmie Lee has worked with creatives such as: André De Shields, Mercedes Ellington, Sir Richard Eyre, Jerry Mitchell, Casey Nicholaw, Arlene Phillips, Kenny Leon, Anthony Lyn, Julie Taymor, Alex Timbers, Schele Williams, and George C. Wolfe.
Jimmie has also managed corporate fundraising and entertainment events for Presidents Barack Obama and Bill Clinton and for the MLK Memorial in Washington, D.C. to name a few.
Kenneth J. McGee
Producing Director, , Broadway Cares Equity Fights AIDS
KENNETH J. McGEE was born in Brooklyn, New York and started his stage management career by working as a production intern on A Grand Night For Singing and the 1994 revival of Picnic, both at the Roundabout Theatre Company.
Kenneth has worked as a stage manager on over 20 Broadway shows including Ohio State Murders, Once On This Island (Revival), Significant Other, An American In Paris, Kinky Boots, Gore Vidal’s The Best Man, Jerusalem, God Of Carnage, In The Heights, Spamalot, Disney’s The Lion King, Aladdin, The Little Mermaid and Tarzan, Rent, Pacific Overtures (2004 Revival), Seussical, On The Town (1998 Revival), Bring In ‘Da Noise, Bring In ‘Da Funk and Jesus Christ Superstar (2000 Revival). Off-Broadway work includes Manhattan Theatre Club, Playwrights Horizons, Classic Stage Company and Lincoln Center.
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Access for Stage Managers of Color