Rebecca (She/Her) is a Black queer playwright, theatre maker, creative writer, singer/songwriter, interdisciplinary artist, communications strategist, and cancer survivor based in Minneapolis (on the Indigenous lands of the Dakhóta and Ojibwe peoples). She’s deeply passionate about the intersections between artistic practice, narrative & storytelling, health, embodied living, and social and environmental justice. She holds an M.F.A. in Playwriting from Columbia University, an M.A. in English Literature, and a B.A. in Liberal Arts/Business Administration. She also studied publishing at the George Washington University in Washington, D.C.

Rebecca has been a practicing artist for 15+ years; having written, developed and performed in creative works that explore Black and queer identities, cancer and chronic illness, climate change, family and what makes us human — through mythology, the embrace of other worlds, and harnessing the power of storytelling to envision what is possible (in ourselves, our communities, and the world). She is the recipient of a Liberace Award, the Howard Stein Fellowship, the Matthews Fellowship, an America-in-Play Fellowship, among others. Rebecca is also founder/artistic director of CLEVELAND-HARRIS THEATRE COMPANY, a Minneapolis-based theatre, performance and public imagination project.

Rebecca is the recipient of a Mentor Series Fellowship (Fiction) from the Loft Literary Center and received an Honorable Mention from the McKnight Foundation (spoken word poetry). Her performance poem, Conjuring Transcendence: Zones, Borders, & Spiritual Visibility (2019) was presented at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis and published in the Star Tribune (2020). Her poem Let the Fires Burn, In this Vibration There is Also Love (2022), about Minneapolis uprisings in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder, was performed at Pangea World Theatre (Life Born of Fire).

Photo Credit: Carina Lofgren. Walker Art Center Citizenship Series (2019)

Rebecca’s fiction, poetry, and performance works include: Submerged (a short story), Black Aurora, Blood as Sea Water, Children of the First Hummingbird, Intelligence, and Zar-Baby, among others. As a book reviewer for IndieReader.com, she authored over twenty book reviews of fiction and creative nonfiction and contributed to “Everybody Pays For It,” published in The Huffington Post. In addition, Rebecca has taught storytelling courses at the Loft Literary Center and Minneapolis College of Art & Design.

Rebecca is a prolific dramatic writer; having written 50+ short and full-length plays. Her play Submerged, an exploration of grief, was performed at Red Eye Theatre. In 2021, she wrote the libretto and vocal arrangement for Dear America, Beat Your Heart Defiantly, Naked & Open with Love, as part of the Minnesota Opera’s MNiatures program cohort. Rebecca is the recipient of a Cedar Cultural Center Commission (2019) for Multicolored Musings: Jewels of Love, Loss, & Triumph (a three-part collection of genre-defying songs she wrote, arranged, and performed). Mara (Pt. 1) includes songs that tell the story of her full-length play with music, Mara Queen of the World; about an African American slave living on a plantation in 1830s Alabama, led into the forest by a mysterious light and given a magic quilt to defeat a dark force. The Infinite Power of a Human Piano (Pt. 2) is a poem that envisions the sound of our humanity. The piece includes an ode to Okonkwo, protagonist of Chinua Achebe’s novel, Things Fall Apart, and vocal excerpts from songs reflective of Black America. Lastly, Romance Elegy (Pt. 3) is a celebration of complex romantic and self-love.

Her other plays include: Cooking with Ellise (a story about a queer cooking show host grappling with her mother’s cancer and relationships with her sister and partner), The Wild Bold Enlightenment of Velvet the Mistress, and Hello, I’m Eve (a re-telling of the creation story with a Black feminist lens);  2013 winner of the Jane Chambers Student Playwriting Award, among others. Her playwriting & performance works have been showcased at numerous venues in NYC and Minneapolis, including Red Eye Theatre, Pangea World Theatre, Minnesota Opera, Walker Art Center, East Side Freedom Library, Twin Cities Public Television, The Cedar Cultural Center, The Playwright’s Center of Minneapolis (where she was a two-time Many Voices Fellow), Harlem Classical Theatre (playwrights playground), The Fire This Time Festival, and Signature Theatre Company (as part of Columbia University School of the Arts “New Plays Now”), among others. During her Sesame Street Writers’ Room fellowship (created by Sesame Workshop), she wrote a pilot titled Sasha K. Jenkins, Kid Scientist. The script, “Decoding Hamad’s Dream,” was for a children’s T.V. series focused on STEM and problem-solving. Learn more about Rebecca’s plays and performance works.

Rebecca has 15+ years of experience in strategic communications and the nonprofit sector serving Black, Indigenous, Asian American Pacific Islander, Latine, POC, queer, and other historically marginalized communities. She has served as communications director for The Center for Cultural Power (a leading narrative and cultural strategy nonprofit) where she used strategic communications and narrative strategy to amplify the efforts of cultural strategists working to advance social and climate justice through culture change. She also led a team of dynamic BIPOC communications professionals in uplifting the organization’s programs, projects, and initiatives. She has provided communications support for numerous initiatives, including the Constellations Culture Change Fund & Initiative, as well as campaigns connected to reproductive and gender justice, U.S./Mexican border narratives, the climate crisis, and other social issues that impact communities of color. Rebecca has served as communications director for the African American Leadership Forum,  where she developed and implemented the organization’s communications strategy and spearheaded the development and implementation of communications plans for campaigns, its leadership academy, and a collective impact program focused on empowering Minnesota’s Black community. In addition, she’s served as director of digital storytelling for Art 4 New York and has worked as communications associate in the civic tech sector; developing communications plans for projects centered on technology for public good and New York-based civic tech initiatives.

She has also written and edited content for Black Enterprise, a premier business and wealth-building magazine with readership of over 2 million, conducting interviews with nonprofit leaders and entertainment professionals including Alan Jenkins, co-founder/ executive director of The Opportunity Agenda (a communications, research, and policy organization). Rebecca has also interviewed playwright/screenwriter Dominique Morisseau (former story editor for Showtime’s Shameless), as well as Emmy-nominated actor/comedian Anthony Anderson (Black-ish) and series creator Kenya Barris. During her time at Black Enterprise, she provided support for the company’s associated media outlets, such as Our World with Black Enterprise, a network television show featuring interviews with celebrities, newsmakers and thought leaders from around the country, and edited content for the 2015 Black Enterprise Tech ConneXt Summit in Silicon Valley.

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