STAGE TUBE: Timothy Ware's THE PRIDE PROJECT, Episode 5 - 'xoxo Jasmine'

Accidental Pictures presents the online poetry miniseries entitled THE PRIDE PROJECT. They are releasing seven poems every Monday for seven consecutive weeks through June 27th on Facebook and YouTube. These poems, written by Timothy Ware (Broadway's KINKY BOOTS), are performed by 10 American actors of African, Latin, Asian, and European descent. Click below to watch Episode 5, "xoxo Jasmine," starring Lacretta Nicole and Pamela Shandrow!

THE PRIDE PROJECT was inspired by the musical A TASTE OF CHOCOLATE, which follows a young Black man, named Coffee, who is thrust into the position of leading a peaceful movement to protest the killing of an unarmed black boy by police in Montgomery, AL. Being home to the Civil Rights Movement, the community is no stranger to the racial tensions they now face, but Coffee fears that if the secret of his sexuality comes out, the movement could fall apart. How does he reconcile his pride of being a black man, verses his shame of being gay? Somehow, he must find the pride in his shame.

Timothy asked the multiethnic cast of A TASTE OF CHOCOLATE to give him three stereotypes about who they are that bring them pride, and three stereotypes that bring them shame. Thus, THE PRIDE PROJECT was born.

In the miniseries, the 10 actors strip down and begin to spit riveting and sometimes satirical prose. With nothing to hide behind, they get to the raw truth -- that underneath all of the baggage that society, family, and even ourselves, have placed on us, we are all the same. We are all human.