Theatre Leadership Project, Aiming to Diversify Theater Production Staff, Announces Launch
(© David Gordon)
Theater producers Barbara Broccoli, Lia Vollack, Alecia Parker, Patrick Daly, and Travis LeMont Ballenger have joined forces to launch the Theatre Leadership Project, an ambitious nonprofit aimed at providing resources to programs that seek to diversify commercial theatrical leadership.
The new organization has partnered with Black Theatre Coalition and Columbia University's Prince Fellowship to establish a three-year fellowship program which will train, mentor, and place the next generation of Black producers, general managers, company managers, and stage managers in an industry where Black professionals are dramatically underrepresented.
Set to begin in fall 2021, the fellowship programs will be open to candidates across the country who desire careers in commercial theater management or production.
Leah Harris, formerly of Dallas Theater Center and Milwaukee Rep, will serve as program manager. An advisory committee includes figures from all facets of the entertainment industry, including actor Whoopi Goldberg, directors Kamilah Forbes and Whitney White, producer Brian Moreland, and others.
In collaboration with the Theatre Leadership Project, Black Theatre Coalition will create six, two-year general and company management fellowships with six leading Broadway general management offices. After the first two years in the program, Theatre Leadership Project will work to assist fellows with job placement. The project will also partner with the Prince Fellowship to fund a yearly creative producing fellow, which will spend time working in a production office.
All fellows will receive a compensation package that includes health care.
