Uggams, Becker, Hicks and More To Appear In Staged Reading of LITTLE ROCK 9/29 and 9/30

Theater heavyweights Leslie Uggams, Clifton Davis, Alan Campbell, Leslie Becker, Sherry Boone and Rodney Hicks will premiere tomorrow in The Rebel Theater Company's staged reading series of LITTLE ROCK written and directed by Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj. LITTLE ROCK presents untold stories of nine young teenagers otherwise known as the "Little Rock Nine" and their struggles, strengths, hardships, and triumphs over the tragic events of the 1957 Little Rock crisis. The readings will be September 29th at 7pm, and September 30th at 12noon and 7pm at Union Square Theater.

Featured in Little Rock as Arkansan #5 is Tony and Emmy award winner actress/singer Leslie Uggams who most recently appeared on Broadway as Ethel Thayer opposite James Earl Jones in the revival of Ernest Thompson's On Golden Pond. That performance came on the heels of her portrayal of the off-beat society heiress Muzzy Van Hosier in the Tony-award winning musical Thoroughly Modern Millie. Early in 2009, Uggams made an appearance as the legendary jazz singer Lena Horne in a production of the stage musical Stormy Weather at the Pasadena Playhouse in California.

Little Rock was written and directed by Rajendra Ramoon, Artistic Director of Rebel Theater. His NY credits include: The Public Theatre, New Federal Theatre, Classical Theatre of Harlem, Amas Musical Theatre, Lark Play Development Center and Assistant Director on the Tony Award–winning Broadway revival A Raisin in the Sun. His regional theater credits include: The Goodman Theatre, Syracuse Stage, Freedom Theatre, Portland Stage Company, Actors Theatre of Louisville, St.
Louis Black Rep, Crossroads Theatre, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Prince Musical Theatre, and Arkansas Repertory Theatre, where Little Rock was developed. He has held artistic residencies with The Public Theatre, Freedom Theatre, ALLIANCE THEATRE, Kennedy Center, Crossroads Theatre, Lark Play Development Center, Arkansas Repertory Theatre, and Amas Musical Theatre. Rajendra’s written work includes: Little Rock, Mississippi Night, Diss Diss & Diss Dat, Twenty-Five, Gray, Children of the Dream and BlackfootNotes.

To attend, contact wicgrsvp@gmail.com and include name, number of guests, performance date/time. Admission is free.

Maharaj is the co. founder and the artistic advisor of River Voices, an African American Latino playwrighting festival in collaboration with Arkansas Repertory Theatre and the former Associate Artistic Director of Syracuse Stage and the Lark Play Development Center. Maharaj holds a BS from20St. John's University and an MFA from Brooklyn College. He has served as a guest faculty member at both Syracuse School of Drama and Carnegie Mellon School of Drama. Maharaj is the recipient fellowships and awards from National Endowment for the Arts, Theatre Communications Group, the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon

Foundation, Nathan Cummings Foundation, Brooklyn Arts Council grant, Puffin Foundation, Time Warner Diverse Voices Fund, and the Van Lier Directing Fellowship. He is also the recipient of the Woodie King Jr. Award, four Vivian Robinson Audelco awards and was nominated for the 2009 S.A.L.T. Award for Director of the Year.

Little Rock is the result of a three year research project by Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj. This docudrama chronicles the events at Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, which propelled the civil rights movement forward.

Rebel Theater Company’s multimedia presentation chronicles the human experience inside of the events of 1957 while exploring their connections to the challenges and the triumphs of the present day.

Created from nearly 100 interviews, discussions, and research done over a three-year period, the play explores Governor Orval Faubus’ 1957 defiance of the US Supreme Court’s decision stating that segregation in public schools was illegal, triggering a confrontation with President Eisenhower and inflaming passions on both sides of the issue of race.

Rebel Theater is dedicated to establishing and nurturing the highest quality of dynamic and progressive American Theater by using the American Experience. Rebel Theater seeks to fulfill the mission of the Black Theater Movement of the last 40 years by developing new work and classics from a multicultural perspective. The work of Rebel Theater is a celebration of the diverse voices that make the American chorus so strong. By producing new dramatic and musical works and re-imagining the classics, Rebel Theater will push the envelope of what is produced for the American theater, creating a platform for new voices, new traditions and new ideas.