TCG Books presents: First Fridays

TCG Books presents: First Fridays, is an ongoing monthly series of up-close-and-personal live-streamed conversations with TCG playwrights and authors on Facebook and YouTube Live. TCG Books’ First Fridays series features authors from TCG Books’ roster in conversation about their work on the first Friday of every month. Past featured authors include Michael R. Jackson, Dael Orlandersmith, Heidi Schreck, and Larissa FastHorse. Click here to peruse past First Friday archives!

2021-22 TCG Fall-Winter Convening Season

In alignment with TCG’s new mission to lead for a just and thriving theatre ecology, we reimagined our annual Fall Forum into an expanded season of focused convenings. Together we’ll explore what we’ve collectively learned from the unfolding crises around us, how we’ve mobilized responsively and proactively, and how that energy can be operationalized into sustained field transformation. Through virtual summits and an in-person gathering led by the artists at the center of our field, we will uplift the thought leaders who have spent this time of crisis envisioning and beginning the construction of our next world, exploring the questions: What’s different? What's next? Find archival video from our two virtual summits, Advocacy & Financial Resilience and Climate Action in a Global Landscape, as well as video from our Emerging from the Cave: Artists Lead the Way Forum, on this page.

THRIVE! Week 2021

Weeklong programming by, for, and about theatremakers of color. The week featured BIPOC theatre affinity spaces, a conversation with Resmaa Menakem, Healer, New York Times Best-Selling author and Trauma Specialist in conversation with Artistic Director for Penumbra Center for Racial Healing Sarah Bellamy, the fourth Annual Theatres of Color celebration, and our gathering of New BIPOC on the Block. Read more, or watch archival recordings here.

2021 Virtual Conference: Our Theatre Ecology

Our second Virtual Conference was held in two parts between May 13-14 and May 20-21, 2021. Inspired by our new mission to lead for a just and thriving theatre ecology, we'll engaged in a systems check, focusing on three converging areas: PANDEMIC RECOVERY, CLIMATE ACTION and SYSTEMIC ANTI-RACISM, while centering the needs and experiences of BIPOC in the theatre field. Read more, or watch archival recordings here.

TCG’s 60th Anniversary Gala: Our Stories

On May 18th, 2021 for TCG held its 60th Anniversary Gala: Our Stories! The gala celebrated this year's honorees: Ricardo Khan and the Performing Arts Alliance. And featured exclusive performances from Cambodian Rock Band and the Market Theatre Laboratory in Johannesburg, South Africa. The Gala and virtual LIVE afterparty were hosted by drag superstar Shequida.

Climate Action and Environmental Justice - A TCG Summit

On Earth Day, April 22, 2021, TCG hosted an inaugural Climate Action and Environmental Justice - A TCG Summit in partnership with Groundwater Arts, Broadway Green Alliance, and HowlRound as a step toward bringing conversations on climate into theatre’s mainstream. In this moment of reimagining, we have the opportunity to holistically consider our habits and practices of putting art into the world, and to collaboratively develop new, regenerative ones that can benefit both the field and the planet. At this Summit of arts industry leaders and practitioners, we sought to examine the roots of that tree our converging crises are springing from, center the wisdom and experience of BIPOC leaders in this work, and transform ourselves in taking action on behalf of life. Read more about the event, here; view the notes on our Summit Padlet, here, or watch the recording, here.

2020 TCG Fall Forum: A Just and Thriving Theatre Ecology 

Playwrights on Writing for Young Audiences:
A Partnership Between TCG-NEA-TYA/USA

Summer 2020 Remote Learning Series

Too Legit To Quit:
A Virtual Celebration of Theatres of Color

On Wednesday, August 12th, our 3rd Annual Theatres of Color celebration went virtual - after our inaugural gathering and event set the bar high in St. Louis, and last year’s outdoor Block Party in Miami brought the *heat* (literally). Though we couldn't be together in person, we will not miss the opportunity to honor Theatres of Color across the country, who amidst the numerous challenges we now face, are Too Legit To Quit. To view the event's program, please go here.

TCG 2020 Virtual Conference: Re:Emergence

TCG & The Vilcek Foundation present 'Exquisite Agony':
A reading and discussion with Pulitzer Prize-winner Nilo Cruz

On Wednesday, February 19th, 2020, the Vilcek Foundation, in collaboration with TCG, hosted Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and director Nilo Cruz, in a reading and discussion of his latest work, Exquisite Agony. The event celebrated the release of Exquisite Agony, published by TCG with support from the Vilcek Foundation and the New York State Council on the Arts. The play was commissioned by and had its world premiere at Repertorio Español in New York City in 2018 and was produced in Spanish at the Gala Hispanic Theatre in Washington DC, February 6 - March 1, 2020, in a production directed by Nilo Cruz. Read more about this event, here.

TCG's 2020 GALA: Our Stories

TCG'S ANNUAL OUR STORIES GALA supports vital programs and services for the theatre community. The 2020 Gala honored the National Black Theatre Festival and Tony Award Winning playwright, David Henry Hwang. Past honorees at the TCG annual gala include actor arts philanthropist and Chairman Emerita, Ingram Industries Inc. Martha R. Ingram; Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Tony Kushner; and Broadway press agent and President of DKC/O&M Rick Miramontez, Brian Dennehy, director Kenny Leon, playwright Lynn Nottage, actress and playwright Danai Gurira, theatrical producers Stephen C. Byrd and Alia Jones-Harvey, set designer Ming Cho Lee, lighting designer Jules Fisher, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, The Shubert Foundation, The Vilcek Foundation, producers Ruth and Stephen Hendel, Judith O. Rubin, and the creators of War Paint (Scott Frankel, Michael Greif, Michael Korie, and Doug Wright).

2019 TCG Fall Forum: A New Playbook

At the 2019 Fall Forum on Governance: A New Playbook, we got serious about our traditional model and its impact on our day-to-day operations, fundraising practices, organizational culture, and artistic programming processes. We’ll approached this Fall Forum in a three-part structure, featuring conversations on how to improve, rethink, and enhance our organizations’ resources (including income streams and capital structure); our program and organizational structures (including staff infrastructure, board governance, analyses of programs and services, artistic planning, and more); and our impact (how we measure our success, and how we communicate our charitable value). Generative discussion and peer-to-peer learning was woven into two days of breakout sessions, affinity group conversations, and inspiring speakers from within and beyond the nonprofit arts sector. From November 8-10 in New York City, leaders and trustees from TCG Member theatres directly addressed the issue that keeps so many of us up at night: how to keep our organizations financially healthy while continuing to produce powerful theatre that contributes to the cultural vibrancy of our communities. Read more, or watch archival recordings here.

TCG 2019 National Conference: Miami