DEFACING MICHAEL JACKSON

written by Aurin SQUIRE

starring Joshua HERNANDEZ, Xavier Edward KING, Sydney PRESENDIEU and Dylan ROGERS scenic design Frank J OLIVA costume design Grier COLEMAN lighting design Nicole LANG sound design & composition

Quentin CHIAPPETTA choreographer Randolph WARD intimacy choreographer Nicole PERRY fight choreographer Lee SOROKO production stage manager Katelyn BOURKE general manager

Jessica KASCHUBE assistant stage manager

Amanda ORTEGA technical director

Steven NUÑEZ company manager assistant director Katlin SVADBIK

Jenna FERNANDEZ directed by Shaun Patrick TUBBS

Casting by Stephanie Yankwitt, CSA director of social responsibility

Christina ALEXANDER

Produced through special arrangement with the playwright and Original Works Publishing. You may purchase this play and many others by visiting the Original Works website at - www.originalworksonline.com.

CAST (alphabetical)

Joshua HERNANDEZ* jack

Xavier Edward KING* obadiah

Sydney PRESENDIEU frenchy

Dylan ROGERS* red / yellow / commissioner

Katelyn BOURKE* production stage manager

*Member, Actors’ Equity Association

Defacing Michael Jackson is our fourth world premiere with Aurin Squire, a brilliant playwright from our very own community. Aurin’s talent has earned him acclaim not only in the theater world but also in TV, where he is now writing for some of the most popular shows. He has become one of our flagship artist, and our last project together, A Wonderful World , a new musical about Louis Armstrong, is on its way to Broadway, filling us with pride.

This time, Aurin takes us on a semi-autobiographical journey about a group of friends trying to navigate life in the backdrop of racial tensions in the 1980s, including the aftermath of the McDuffie riots and other race riots that marked and scarred our community. Through this story of memory, friendship, sexual awakening, hero worship, racism, colorism, and gentrification, Aurin explores contemporary hot topics with subtlety and heart. His love for the characters and the community shines through every scene.

We are honored to work with director Shaun Patrick Tubbs and an exceptional cast and design team. We hope you enjoy the show and that it leads to great conversations . Thank you for supporting Miami New Drama and for being a part of our community.

Michel Hausmann | Artistic Director

AURIN SQUIRE (Playwright) is a playwright, reporter, and television writer from South Florida. Squire is a co-executive producer on the tv dramas The Good Fight and Evil He has been nominated for two NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Writing in a Drama Series, a BlackReel Award, and a WGA Award for his work on This is Us. In theatre, Squire’s plays have been produced in London, Toronto, and around the United States. At Miami New Drama, he co-wrote Confessions of a Cocaine Cowboy with Billy Corben and wrote the book for the Louis Armstrong musical, A Wonderful World. He has been awarded the Helen Merrill Award for Emerging Playwrights, Seattle Public Theatre’s Emerald Prize for new plays, and National Black Theatre’s I Am Soul playwriting fellowship. Squire was also a writer on Miami New Drama’s 7 Deadly Sins, which won a Drama League Award for Outstanding Interactive Theatre. He is a New Dramatists resident playwright, a member of the Dramatists Guild of America, and the Writers Guild of America. He graduated from The Juilliard School and Northwestern University.

SHAUN PATRICK TUBBS (Director) is a New York based director and actor. Selected directing credits include The Tempest (Powerhouse Theatre), Troilus and Cressida (Juilliard), Sweat (Wright State), Life Is A Dream (Juilliard), In The Blood (Juilliard), BLACK DICK (NYTW), Lost in the Stars (Union Avenue Opera), Independence Eve (Signature Theatre DC), Well-Intentioned White People (Orlando Shakespeare), hop tha A (Ars Nova), Artney Jackson (The Lark/New Black Festival), and Disgraced (Asolo Repertory Theatre). Selected acting credits include STAINED (New Ohio Theater), Terminus (NYTW), The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

Abridged (Human Race Theatre), My Mañana Comes (Marin Theatre Company), The Book of Grace (Zach Scott Theatre), Crossing America (Kirk Douglas Theatre), Lobby Hero (Ensemble Theatre of Santa Barbara), and Jitney (Human Race Theatre). Shaun is a recipient of numerous awards and fellowships. He holds an MFA from The University of Texas at Austin and a BFA from Wright State University. Member of SDC, AEA, and SAGAFTRA. www.shaunpatricktubbs.com

XAVIER EDWARD KING (Obadiah) is a Jeff-nominated actor based in Chicago. He comes to Miami coming off the award-winning show Relentless at the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. Other regional theatres include Actors Theatre of Louisville, ACT, Peninsula Players, St. Louis Shakespeare, and Notre Dame Shakespeare, to name a few. Xavier will take up the mantle of Hamlet this summer. You can watch him on this upcoming season of 61st Street on AMC.

JOSHUA HERNANDEZ (Jack) (he/ they) is an NYC based actor/filmmaker from Miami, FL. Previous theatre credits include Admissions and The White Card (GableStage). TV credits include Dear Edward (Apple TV). BA in Theatre, Florida State University, member of AEA and SAGAFTRA. www.joshuahernandez.co

SYDNEY PRESENDIEU (Frenchy) is beyond excited to be returning back to the stage with her second professional theater production Defacing Michael Jackson! She is a New World school of the arts alumni with her BFA & made her professional debut with Mlima‘s Tale by Lynn Nottage with Zoetic Stage last Fall. Some of her favorite roles throughout her career include: Queen Margaret in Henry VI part 3, Satan in The last days of Judas Iscariot, and her own one person show exploring her roots in Haiti entitled Tifi Natif Natal (the native girl). She is incredibly grateful to be able to collaborate with such talented artists on stage and behind the scenes. She thanks her family, friends and mentors for the abundant guidance and inspiration!

DYLAN ROGERS (Red/Yellow/ Commissioner) is an actor and native of the Chicagoland area, and he is really excited to be performing for the first time in Miami! He graduated from Aurora University and has trained at Acting Studio Chicago and Second City. His theater credits include Relentless, A Christmas Carol, She Kills Monsters, Sled Hill, The Bluest Eye, and Eurydice. He has also appeared in the films CRSHD, Post, and Crossing. Upcoming projects include the romantic comedy Take Me To Banaue and the TV series Frame Of Reference.

FRANK J OLIVA (Scenic Designer) is an award-winning Cuban-American Stage Designer. Recent projects include productions with Miami New Drama, Area Stage Company, Gablestage, The Shed, Ars Nova, Cherry Lane Theatre, Clubbed Thumb, Geva Theatre, Weston Playhouse, Two River Theatre, and The Cincinnati Symphony, among others. Associate Designer on the recent Broadway productions of The Collaboration, Death of a Salesman, Oklahoma!, West Side Story and Hangmen. Theatre Designer for Netflix’s Marriage Story. Frank is the recipient of The Silver Palm Award, an Innovative Theatre Award for Stage Design and was nominated for Audelco and Carbonell Award. His designs have been featured in the American exhibit at the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design. Member of Wingspace Theatrical Design, member of United Scenic Artists and a graduate of New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts. www.frankjoliva.com

GRIER COLEMAN (Costume Designer) is pleased to make her Miami New Drama Debut with Defacing Michael Jackson! Off Broadway: The Naturalists (Pond Theater Company), You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown (York Theater Company), Missed Connections: The Craigslist Musical (The New Ohio); Regional: Arcadia (Yale Repertory); The Parchman Hour (Virginia Stage Company); Little Women, Steel Magnolias (Virginia Theatre Festival) Julius Caesar, Disgraced, The Crucible, DOT, Life of Galileo (Playmakers Repertory); The Fantasticks, All My Sons, A Doll’s House, Part 2 (Weston Playhouse) Fifteen seasons at The Juilliard School designing Drama, Dance, and Opera; MFA: Yale School of Drama. United Scenic Artist 829 www.griercoleman.com

NICOLE E LANG (Lighting Designer) is a designer for performance based in New York City. Her recent designs include Richard II & Henry IV Workshop (Theatre for a New Audience), Hanging with Clarence (Park Avenue Armory), Today Is My Birthday (Yale Repertory Theatre), AMBER/BLUE (Belinda McGuire Dance Projects), Bulgaria! Revolt!, Fallen Angels (Quinnipiac University), A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Outcasts (American Academy of Dramatic Arts), When Day Comes (Crossroads Theatre Company), the moment before..., and bodyssey (Yale Cabaret). Nicoleelang.com

QUENTIN CHIAPPETTA (Sound Designer/ Composer) enjoys a wide ranging career as a composer, sound designer and mixer for film, television, museum installations and theater. Theater credits include: Broadway: Irena’s Vow, 59e59: Murder in the First, Road to Damascus. The Pearl: Martin Luther on Trial. Theater Row: The Snow Orchid. Cherry Lane: Catching the Butcher. St Clements: Sideways, Mornings at Seven. Workshop: The Navigator. CSC: Miss Julie, Dance of Death. Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel nominations, Innovative Theatre Award winner. Other recent projects include Sound Design for the multi-channel permanent exhibition entitled Entertainment Nation at the Smithsonian Museum of American History and music and design for the award winning documentary Terrible Children and the sound work for Director by Night now streaming on Disney Plus. quentinchiappetta.com

RANDOLPH WARD (Choreographer) born and raised in Miami, his love of dance began here. Randolph received a 2019-2020 MiamiDade County Cultural Affairs Choreographs’ (DMC) Award and a 2020 Capital Arts Partnership Award for his work Boys Will Be Boys. In 2020, Ward produced two short films commissioned for the Arsht Center’s Arsht@ Home named Solitary Confinement & The Art of Vogue. His work A Vogue Extravaganza premiered in 2019 and was featured on 91.3 NPR by WLRN reporter Nadege Green. He has received a Unity Coalition Legends Honors Award, Miami Light Project Here & Now commission, Columbus Arts Council Choreography Award, Violetta Boft Award, and was featured in Pointe Magazine’s 2003 V.I.P. List. Randolph is retired from a 15-year dance career that has taken him across the United States and through Europe and Asia, living in Saarbrücken, Germany for six years. Ward is the founder and the Creative Director of RTWDANCE.

NICOLE PERRY (Intimacy Choreographer) is a Silver Palm award-winning intimacy director, as well as intimacy coordinator and dance choreographer in South Florida. Career highlights include 2 Broward County Artist Investment Grants for KINesphere (siteinspired dance works), intimacy coordination for God Forbid on Hulu, and a Carbonell nomination for the intimacy direction of To Fall in Love at Theatre Lab. Nicole is a Certified Laban/Bartenieff Movement Analyst. She holds an MFA from Goddard College. She apprenticed with Intimacy Directors International, and is certified by Intimacy Directors and Coordinators (IDC). Nicole is an adjunct professor of dance at the University of Miami. Memberships: Stage Directors and Choreographers Society, Dance Studies Association, National Dance Education Organization, Association of Theatre Movement Educators

LEE SOROKO (Fight Choreographer) is delighted to return to Miami New Drama, having previously choreographed the violence for A Wonderful World, Confessions of a Cocaine Cowboy, Gente Ociosa, and The Gollum of Havana. He is a Fight Director, Certified Teacher of Stage Combat and a Theatrical Firearms Instructor with the Society of American Fight Directors who earned his MFA from the Professional Actor Training Program at the University of Texas. Lee is a National Endowment for the Arts Fellowship recipient for his work in character mask and he provides professional fight choreography for theater, opera companies and universities across America. In South Florida he has worked with the Florida Grand Opera, Palm Beach Opera, Maltz-Jupiter Theatre, Palm Beach Dramaworks, Zoetic Stage and Slow Burn Theatre. Currently, Lee is the Assistant Professor of Movement at Florida Atlantic University.

KATELYN BOURKE (Stage Manager) is a Miami-based theater artist, choreographer, and stage manager. She is a Florida International University graduate with a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre with a Minor in Dance. Some recent credits include Anna in the Tropics (SM), The Courage (SM) and Elián (ASM) with Miami New Drama and Matilda, Clue, and the School of Rock with Artistic Vibes Kids. Some of her performance credits include Eve Addaman in She Stoops to Comedy and Betty Lovell in Red Velvet. She,

Miami Beach

Alton Rd, Miami Beach, FL - - | osteriamorini.com along with her castmates, were even invited to perform in South Carolina as part of the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival. Katelyn has experience in teaching music and creative movement for tiny humans, as well as dance, movement for actors, and musical theater for performers of all ages! Katelyn would also like to thank everyone at Miami New Drama for welcoming her to the team with open arms.

Emilia-Romagna cuisinefresh housemade pasta, extensive wine list, delicious entrées, and cra cocktails for Breakfast, Lunch, Happy Hour, and Dinner on South Beach.

AMANDA ORTEGA (Assistant Stage Manager) is excited to work with Miami New Drama for the first time as the ASM for Defacing Michael Jackson. Amanda received her BFA in Acting from Florida International University, working through the industry as an actress, playwright, director, set-builder, and stage manager.

KATLIN SVADBIK (Assistant Director) is a Miami-based Theater maker who is happy to be working with the MiND team again. This is her first professional production as an Assistant Director. Katlin is passionate about the realm of directing, having mounted a production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot during her BFA training at New World School of the Arts. She’s performed onstage at various Miami theaters, including Miami New Drama’s production of The Cuban Vote. She earned a Carbonell Nomination for her performance as Avery Willard in Rapture, Blister, Burn (Main Street Players, 2022).

STEPHANIE YANKWITT (Casting Director)

(she/her) is owner of the NYC based TBD Casting Co., which specializes in casting new work across all mediums including Theatre, Television and Film. TBD is strongly committed to inclusion and diversity of ALL kinds, and prioritizes casting every project in a way that truly mirrors the heterogeneity of the real world. With strong backgrounds in Producing and Dramaturgy, we work tirelessly to ensure that the creator’s vision of the story unfolds in dynamic and diverse ways. New York highlights include Frankie & Johnny in the Clare de Lune by Terrence McNally, starring Audra McDonald and Michael Shannon, Zora Howard’s Stew for Page 73 Productions, and Jackie Sibblies Drury’s Fairview for Soho Rep and Theatre for a New Audience, which won the 2019 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. This past Spring, tbd cast the first season of a hybrid docuseries for Disney+/Culture House. TBD Casting Co. is the resident casting office for Soho Repertory Theatre, and frequent collaborators of Tectonic Theater Project in NYC, and La Jolla Playhouse in San Diego. Stephanie sits on the Equity in Entertainment Committee of the CSA.

MICHEL HAUSMANN (Artistic Director) is a Venezuelan-born theater director, producer, and writer. He is the recipient of the Drama League Award for conceiving and directing Seven Deadly Sins, “the biggest live professional theater production in the country” during the pandemic (The New York Times). He is the founder and Artistic Director of Miami New Drama, the largest bilingual theater company in the country and resident and operator of the historic Colony Theatre on Miami Beach. Under his artistic leadership, Miami New Drama has produced world premiere plays that are as diverse, multicultural, and multilingual as Miami›s extraordinary community, including: A Wonderful World, Confessions of a Cocaine Cowboy, ¡Viva La Parranda!, The Cubans, Fake, When Monica Met Hillary, Gente Ociosa, Queen Of Basel, Papá Cuatro, The Cuban Vote, 7 Deadly Sins, and the first multilingual production of Our Town. Other productions include The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity (in co-production with Asolo Rep), The Album (in co-production with Tectonic Theater Project), A Special Day (in co-production with The Play Company), Terror (Directed by Gregory Mosher), One Night in Miami...(Directed by Carl Cofield), The Bridge of San Luis Rey (Directed by David Greenspan), among others. Michel is the book writer and director of The Golem Of Havana, a critically acclaimed original musical that has been produced across the country, including a sold-out, extended run at the Colony Theatre. Hausmann’s Off-Broadway credits include the New York Premiere of Vassily Sigarev’s Black Milk and the New York premiere of The Color Of Desire by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Nilo Cruz. He was the co-founder and Artistic Director of an award-winning theater company in Venezuela, where he directed over a dozen productions. Michel received a BA from Emerson College and an MFA in Theater Directing from Columbia University. He is a New York Theater Workshop 2050 Fellow, an IRNE nominee, a Silver Palm Award winner, a Richard Rodgers Award finalist, and a two-time Knights Arts Challenge Award recipient.

NICHOLAS RICHBERG (Managing Director) is Cuban-American award-winning producer, actor, and nonprofit executive who has received critical acclaim for his broad range of work. Under his executive leadership Miami New Drama has produced 7 Deadly Sins, The Bridge of San Luis Rey, The Cubans, A Wonderful World, When Monica Met Hillary, The Cuban Vote, Papá Cuatro, Elián, and Anna in the Tropics. He previously served as Managing Director of Zoetic Stage at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, where he produced numerous world premiere and award-winning plays and musicals. As an actor and director, Richberg has voiced national radio campaigns, appeared on national television, and worked in theaters across the country, including nearly every stage in South Florida, originating numerous roles, including in Confessions of a Cocaine Cowboy at Miami New Drama prior to his tenure as Managing Director. He is a Drama League Award winner, Carbonell Award winner, multiple Silver Palm Award winner, twice named Best Actor by Miami New Times, and was named a Miami Leader by the Miami Foundation. A Miami native, Richberg is a graduate of Miami Country Day School and University of Miami Frost School of Music. He holds a Certificate in Nonprofit Management from Duke University and an MBA from IE Business School (Madrid) and Brown University.

MIAMI NEW DRAMA is a nonprofit professional theater company based in Miami Beach, Florida committed to artistic excellence and groundbreaking work, with a vision of theater as a powerful form of social engagement. In residence at the historic Colony Theatre on Miami Beach, the company focuses on the development of new plays and musicals in both English and Spanish, most notably 7 Deadly Sins, winner of the 2021 Drama League Award for Outstanding

Interactive or Socially-Distanced Theater, the world premiere development of the new Louis Armstrong musical A Wonderful World, When Monica Met Hillary by Winter Miller, Puras Cosas Maravillosas by Duncan Macmillan, the first ever multilingual adaptation of Thornton Wilder’s classic Our Town, The Cubans by Michael Leon, Confessions of a Cocaine Cowboy by Billy Corben & Aurin Squire, Queen of Basel by Hilary Bettis, Viva La Parranda! by Betsayda Machado and La Parranda El Clavo in collaboration with Juan Souki, and Gente Ociosa by Karin Valecillos. Miami New Drama is the winner of two Knight Arts Challenge awards and a Knight New Works Miami award from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation. It was the 2018 and 2022 Miami New Times Best Theater for Drama and was honored with the Thornton Wilder Prize in 2022.

ACTORS’ EQUITY ASSOCIATION (AEA)

, founded in 1913, represents more than 50,000 actors and stage managers in the United States. Equity seeks to advance, promote and foster the art of live theatre as an essential component of our society. Equity negotiates wages and working conditions, providing a wide range of benefits, including health and pension plans. AEA is a member of the AFLCIO, and is affiliated with FIA, an international organization of performing arts unions. The Equity emblem is our mark of excellence. www.actorsequity.org

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