DISPATCH 06.19.26:
HOMEGOING / HOMECOMING
Featuring excerpts from
Medicine Woman
Written and performed by Andrea Ambam
Smile, Goddamnit, Smile
Written by Zola Dee
Directed by Onyekachi Iwu
Performed by Amen Igbinosun
Auntie Auntie
Written by Camille Simone Thomas
Directed by Onyekachi Iwu
Performed by Patrice Johnson and Celeste Sena
With musical guest Arewà Basit
Andrea Ambam (she/her) | is an award-winning storyteller and truthteller whose roots sprout from Cameroon. Pulsating at the intersection of art and social change as a playwright, director, performance artist, and creative producer, Andrea has developed her unruly imagination through collaborations with PAC-NYC, New York Theatre Workshop, PEN America, Hi-ARTS, Rattlestick Theater, Broadway Advocacy Coalition, Working Theater, Signature Theatre, The Apollo, National Black Theatre, and more. Currently, she is a JACK Resident Artist and the Director of Programming at Level Forward where she stewards the Anthem Award-winning audience engagement platform More To Talk About. www.andreaambam.com
Camille Simone Thomas (she/her) | is a 5th generation African-American Detroiter through her father’s side and a first generation Jamaican through her mother’s. It’s important for her to name this because her work most often interrogates cultural legacies, familial healing, spirituality + ancestral wisdom, and the general kicking and screaming of how Black folks get free despite the oppressive forces of colonialism, capitalism, and white supremacy. She’s a multi-hyphenate playwright-producer-performer-educator-facilitator. www.camillesthomas.com
Zola Dee (she/her) | is a playwright, screenwriter, actor and banjo player whose written works are deeply invested in exploring Black Americana, African diasporic religions, and imagining freer worlds for the Black collective body. Her plays include GUNSHOT MEDLEY; Smile, Goddamnit, Smile; and [Home]going. Other accomplishments include: 2025 Kesselring Prize for Playwriting, 2025 - 2028 Jerome Hill Fellow, 2023 I Am Soul National Black Theater Resident Playwright, Playwrights’ Center Jerome Fellow 2022-2023, Playwrights’ Center Many Voices Fellow 2021-2022. Zola holds a BFA in Acting and a minor in Creative Writing from the California Institute of the Arts. www.zoladee.com
Onyekachi Iwu (she/her) | is a Nigerian American director and playwright from Nashville, TN. As a director, Iwu was a member of the 2022-2024 WP Directing Lab and has developed new work with Mercury Store, New Dramatists, MCC Theater, The Public Theater, and The Civilians. As an associate/assistant director, Iwu has worked with Daniel Aukin ("Stereophonic"), Anne Kauffman ("The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window"), and Katie Posner ("Strategic Love Play"). Her Southern horror play, "the magical south", was a finalist for the 2024 Drama League Beatrice Terry Residency. Iwu's work often explores themes of love, sisterhood, violence, and transformation. onyekachiiwu.com
Arewà Basit (she/her) | is a New York-based multidisciplinary artist, musician, and performer whose work moves between sound, image, and body. As both a creative and model, she has become a vital voice at the intersection of trans identity, Black aesthetics, and futurist performance. On her Archive EP (2026) Arewà weaves together ambient soul, experimental R&B, and new-wave gospel into a Black trans folk-sound all her own, crafting an emotional cartography of ancestry and becoming. Whether on stage, on screen, in fashion and beauty campaigns, or through her sonic endeavors, Arewà’s practice offers a radical invitation to witness transformation in real time.
Amen Igbinosun (he/him) | is an actor, writer, director, producer, educator, and arts leader whose work explores experimental performance, cultural memory, and storytelling across the African diaspora. As Executive Director of JACK, he champions bold, artist-driven work and adventurous contemporary performance. His stage and screen credits include TNT's The Last Ship and collaborations with Taylor Mac and Dmitry Krymov. Amen brings together deep craft and fearless experimentation, believing theater is where people gather to remember, imagine, and reckon with the world.
Celeste Sena (she/her) | is an actress, singer, and dancer based in NYC. Her Off-Broadway theater work includes King Lear at La Mama (directed by Karin Coonrad), This Purple F*** Pot by Andrew Moorhead (CAM Studios). Regional theater: Shakespeare the Remix (Capital Repertory), Vanguards: Collected Excerpts from Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow (Crossroads Theater Company). Her recent on-screen TV and film work include Poker Face (S2E1 on Peacock/ NBC), Welcome to AfroTree (Warner Bros/OneFifty), Undercover Life (A&E Networks) and Rap Pack starring Emmy-winning actor Jharrel Jerome. She has also done a series of commercials for Etsy, Ally Bank and Totino’s Pizza Rolls. CelesteSena.com
Patrice Johnson Chevannes (she/her) | is an award-winning Jamaican-American actress, writer, filmmaker, director, & executive producer of God-and-all-o-wee Productions & Ubigwitus Records. Broadway: The Crucible; Desdemona opposite Sir Patrick Stewart in Othello. Off-Broadway: The Waterfall; Tamburlaine; Pericles; Coriolanus; Homecoming Queen. Nominations: Drama League Nomination for The Waterfall; Elliot Norton for The Grove; Lucille Lortel for Endgame; Drama Desk & Drama League for runboyrun/In Old Age. TV/Film: POSE; SHRILL; EVIL; The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel; The Good Fight. She has written and directed three award-winning films: Kings County; NY’s Dirty Laundry; and Hill & Gully. Patrice teaches MFA Acting at The New School; Public Speaking at Columbia University to Obama Foundation Scholars. She’s a member of The Actor’s Center.
THE PARSNIP SHIP CREW
Producing Artistic Director + Host Iyvon E. (she/her)
Associate Artistic Director Al Parker (they/them)
Marketing Director SkittLeZ Ortiz (they/them)
Digital Operations Director Todd Kirkland (he/him)
Sound Engineer Artem Kulakov
Sound Editor Luke DiCola (he/him)
Production Assistant Myren Mandap (they/them)
JACK
Executive Director Amen Igbinosun (he/him)
Director of Production and Operations John-Philip Faienza (he/him)
Associate Artistic Director Kiará Johnson (she/they)
Thank you to Bryan Joseph Lee, the DCLA Cultural Development Fund (City of New York), A.R.T./NY, Brooklyn Arts Council, our subscribers, our collaborators, and our audience!
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JACK is an Obie Award–winning arts center based in Brooklyn, dedicated to fueling experiments in art and activism. By presenting adventurous work in theater, music, and performance, JACK creates a space where communities meet, ideas spark, and change takes root. Learn more online at jackny.org.