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Teniola Ayoola

Beyoncé’s Fourth of July Show Redefined American Music, Legacy, and Spectacle

Posted on July 14, 2025

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in Washington City Paper here.

On the Fourth of July, Beyoncé Giselle Knowles-Carter stood center stage at Northwest Stadium in Landover and redefined what American music, legacy, and spectacle looks like. Her Cowboy Carter Tour stop wasn’t just a concert—it was a living, breathing art installation, a cultural exegesis, a Black feminist thesis, a family archive, and a stage production worthy of Broadway.

In one of the night’s most visually arresting moments, Beyoncé appeared on screen as a larger-than-life figure, strutting through major cities across the U.S.—from Houston to New York to Las Vegas. But when she arrived in D.C., gliding past the White House, towering over the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial, the stadium erupted.

There is no place more loaded with meaning on July 4 than D.C. For Beyoncé to perform this show—one rooted in Southern Black identity, defiance, and American reclamation—on this date felt like a deliberate choice. The show opened with a knowing wink: Beyoncé at the center of a screen flashing red, white, and blue, performing “The Star-Spangled Banner.” Her version, however, was laced with the rebellious instrumental arrangement originally performed by Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock in 1969.

Despite Cowboy Carter’s musical brilliance, some critics and country purists questioned whether Beyoncé belonged in the genre at all—a familiar refrain for Black artists in traditionally White spaces. The song “Texas Hold ’Em” was initially rejected by some country radio stations, reigniting long-standing tensions about gatekeeping in American music. After rejecting a listener’s request for “Texas Hold ’Em,” the manager at Oklahoma radio station KYKC, explained, “We do not play Beyoncé on KYKC as we are a country music station.”

Beyoncé addressed the criticism head-on. The backlash didn’t undermine her message—it amplified it. From the moment fans trickled into the stadium—many clad in denim, fringe, rhinestones, boots, and custom cowboy hats—it was clear this wasn’t just a tour; it was a movement. And when the singer finally emerged, cloaked in a massive American flag robe, Beyoncé made it known: This wasn’t about performing for a nation. This was about reclaiming it.

Backed by pounding drums and glittering visuals, Beyoncé asked the 50,000 or so audience members, “Can you hear me? Do you feel me?” The audience responded loudly. What followed was a dynamic set list that unfolded over roughly two hours. There were songs from Cowboy Carter, but also from 2003’s Dangerously in Love, 2008’s I Am… Sasha Fierce, 2011’s 4, and more. As strangers in the crowd belted out, “To the left, to the left…” in unison, it felt like more than a duet—it felt like community.

Midway through the concert, Beyoncé mused, “Genre is such a weird concept.” In that moment—surrounded by country riffs, rock undertones, voguing interludes, ballet pirouettes, trap beats, tap dancing, the iconic bounce-on-that-shit Riverdance step, and a drop into the gritty “Nigga ask about me” from Crazy in Love (Homecoming Live)—her point landed. She moved from elegant to guttural, soft to sharp, as if to ask: Who said I had to choose?

And in D.C., where musical legacies run deep, Beyoncé’s refusal to be boxed in echoed one of the city’s most defining genres: go-go. Born in the District and pioneered by the legendary Chuck Brown, go-go has never been just one thing. It fuses funk, soul, gospel, and call-and-response rhythms, drawing energy from both pop and percussion-heavy West African traditions.

Back onstage in Landover, Beyoncé honored her lineage. A graphic featured Black icons like Tina Turner. And at the start of “Formation,” her dancers broke into a clean, syncopated hat routine—gyrations and hip thrusts delivered with precision—a quiet, but unmistakable homage to Michael Jackson.

Outside the spectacle, the show struck deeply personal chords for the audience. For many, it was a night of full-bodied joy—dancing in the stands, sipping drinks on the party bus, and bonding with strangers over shared lyrics. Singing “Irreplaceable” together wasn’t just serendipity. It was the communal spirit Beyoncé cultivates—on and off stage.

Through it all, Beyoncé didn’t just perform. She reminded the crowd that she—and Black people, especially Black women—are America. Not in the political sense, as in presidents or lawmakers, but in the mythic one: the soul, rhythm, and story of the nation itself. Her journey from Houston girl group prodigy to global powerhouse is a story of grit, grace, and genre defiance—but also a reflection of Black resilience, ingenuity, and creative power. On July 4 in D.C., Beyoncé didn’t just put on a show—she claimed space. It wasn’t about fitting in. It was about standing firm.

Shakespeare Theatre Company’s Latest Production Recenters Frankenstein on the Women at Its Heart 

Posted on June 13, 2025

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in Washington City Paper here.

It is a packed house on opening night of Shakespeare Theatre Company’s production Frankenstein. Onstage angular, dark wood beams frame a tall, imposing fireplace and a singular chair sits with a robe hanging on its back. Atmospheric lighting by Neil Austin and an eerie soundscape by André Pluess create the sense of haunting loss that anchors the production. But no green-skinned monster ever grunts into the frame. Instead, the monster in British director and writer Emily Burns’ adaptation is grief, privilege, and masculine neglect.  

Burns, known for her incisive adaptations and storytelling precision at the National Theatre and with the Royal Shakespeare Company, is making her American directorial debut with Frankenstein. A project that began in 2020, when Burns, who has worked with STC’s artistic director Simon Godwin for nearly a decade and adapted last year’s star-studded Macbeth, submitted a seven-page treatment to STC, envisioning a version of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein told through a feminist lens. The company commissioned her to develop it into a full production. Over the next several years, with input from STC’s dramaturg, Drew Lichtenberg, she worked on her adaptation.

Burns began by interrogating what she saw as a contradiction at the heart of Shelley’s story: Frankenstein is one of the most iconic horror and science fiction novels ever written, and it was authored by a woman—yet both the original text and many of its best-known adaptations revolve almost entirely around male characters. 

“I was thinking about how male-focused Nick Dear’s 2011 stage adaptation is and how male-focused the novel is, and yet how it’s a female writer,” she says, before asking, “Why is it focused on men?”

With the goal of recentering the women in Shelley’s story, Burns turned to the original 1818 Frankenstein, where Victor Frankenstein’s abandonment—both of his wife, Elizabeth, and the Creature—is clearly condemned. Later revisions blurred that line, she says. According to Burns, the original, released anonymously, was far more emotionally raw and politically pointed. “It’s filled with ambitious men who are trying to create a name for themselves in their world,while she [Shelley] is at home trying to conceive, birth, and raise these children,” she says.

Before Victor brought his creature to life, Frankenstein was already a story shaped by maternal loss and abandonment. Shelley wrote the original story while in the throes of pregnancy, nursing, and grieving the death of her first child. The suicide of her sister also likely influenced her writing as did her husband’s—the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley—alleged affairs. It’s no surprise, then, that the 1818 version lays clear blame at Victor’s feet for abandoning the creature he created.

Deemed “too radical for Victorian sensibilities,” the second edition, released in 1823—with a manuscript edited by her husband—and a later version in 1831 softened that critique. Victor’s behavior became more fatalistic, his ambition framed as inevitable rather than negligent. Burns’ adaptation returns to the urgency of Shelley’s original. “Victor’s culpability and acceptance of culpability is kind of the central focus,” she says. “It’s not an immaculate conception. It’s this idea of a man creating life and then not taking responsibility for it.”

The result, now on stage through June 29, is a retelling that shifts the center of gravity—away from Victor’s ambition and toward the emotional, moral, and maternal fallout left in his wake. It’s about men, stitched together by ego and the privilege to walk away—from their partners, their children, their responsibilities—and still be worshipped for what they “created.”

Burns draws a direct line from Shelley’s lived experience—her personal tragedies echo throughout the play—to Elizabeth’s fictional fate. Multi-hyphenate artist Rebecca S’manga Frank, who plays Elizabeth, says she felt those parallels deeply: “I know this woman. This is the woman that’s us. And she wrote that.” 

For Frank, Frankenstein isn’t just a Gothic story—it’s a map of female survival, of turning pain into expression. “Mary had miscarriage after miscarriage, she had children die … she had this incredible husband-lover situation, but then it turned into tragedy.”

That transformation—of tragedy into art—is something Frank sees as a uniquely powerful human instinct, and often a feminine one. “The potential to take something dark or tragic and to turn it into something beautiful—that is a choice,” she says. “Because you could choose to stay in the darkness … or you could choose to follow the light.”

She likens it to alchemy: composting what’s been discarded or devalued and repurposing it into something luminous. “You bring it back up to the light and transform it.”

With Frank at the helm, Burns has created a play that doesn’t just reinterpret Shelley—it reclaims her. Her adaptation captures what was always there but rarely centered. It honors the trauma of motherhood, the clarity of womanhood, and the slow, devastating truths about the men we mythologize as geniuses—without asking who was sacrificed along the way.

Galatea: A Mythical Love Story, Playfully Reimagined by Theatre Prometheus

Posted on May 9, 2025

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in Washington City Paper here.

Local small theaters may not always have the budget for elaborate sets or mind-bending special effects—especially when tackling mythological fare featuring Roman deities—but what Theatre Prometheus may lack in spectacle, it more than makes up for in heart, humor, and daring reinterpretation. In Galatea, a rarely performed 16th-century pastoral play by John Lyly, director Tracey Erbacher delivers a thoughtful and thematically rich production that reclaims ancient myth to tell a modern story of love unbound by gender or convention.

Set in a coastal village where, every five years, a virgin must be sacrificed to Neptune to prevent his wrath, Galatea opens with a nod to the belief that sexual orientation is predestined and unchangeable: “Destiny may be deferred, not prevented.” The heart of the story centers on two maidens—portrayed as a biracial couple—Galatea (Amber Patrice Coleman) and Phillida (Cate Ginsberg), each disguised as boys by their fathers to avoid becoming the sacrificial offering. Their fateful meeting leads to mutual confusion, comedic asides, and a tender unfolding of desire—performed with warmth and sincerity by both actors.

Most of the characters, including the male roles, are played by women and nonbinary actors—an artistic choice that prompts reflection on the fluidity of gender, identity, and affection. The ever-regal Diana (Rakell Foye), goddess of chastity, faces off with Venus (Marley Kabin), goddess of love, in a divine battle that mirrors the play’s central tension between virtue and passion. Anyone who has wrestled with the age-old tug-of-war between what the heart wants and what the head advises will recognize this mythic conflict—desire pushing against decorum, instinct clashing with expectation.

Yet it’s the lone male actor who arguably steals the show. Neptune, played thunderously and charismatically by Matthew Crawford, commands the stage with a booming voice befitting his volatile mythological persona. His performance strikes a clever balance between gravitas and levity—at one point cheekily polling the audience for an accent, landing on a crowd-requested Scottish brogue—before later delivering one of the play’s most distilled reflections on its core tension: “Diana must I honor for her chastity, and Venus must I worship for her love.”

Cupid, played by Tristin Evans and costumed with cheeky flair in pink and blue Converse and pastel tones (a clever design by Cheyenne Hill), serves as the impish instigator. With a wink and a bow, they enchant Diana’s virginal huntresses, causing the god to fall head over heels for Galatea and Phillida. 

The production design, while modest, supports the storytelling. Simone Schneeberg’s set—featuring a shattered marble temple and glow-in-the-dark painted trees—offers a visually symbolic backdrop of the woods where much of the action unfolds. Sound designer Levi Manners enhances the atmosphere with rolling wave effects, grounding the sea god’s looming presence. A few technical enhancements, however, might have helped streamline the pacing—dimmed lighting or targeted spotlights during the lengthy asides, for instance, could have replaced the repeated back-and-forth sprints across the stage.

Still, these are minor quibbles in a production that excels at making centuries-old language feel accessible and immediate. One particularly memorable moment finds characters breaking the fourth wall to riff on the power of fate, comparing two real-life couples in the audience—one, they joke, bound by materialism; the other, by destiny.

When Galatea and Phillida eventually discover each other’s true identities, they pledge to do whatever it takes to remain together—a testament to how true love adapts and transforms itself in devotion to the other. In a contemporary context, the moment quietly echoes the societal pressures that make gender-affirming health care a necessary act of survival in order to avoid “hard chance in this world.” It’s a scene of radical kindness and quiet defiance, made all the more poignant by the play’s enduring relevance. “Love is greatest in name but lowest in virtue,” Diana proclaims. But in Galatea, though Cupid may meddle and destiny may delay, love—real, soul-deep love—emerges as a powerful force that transcends rules, roles, and even divine interference.

Art as a call to action: William Gropper’s bold critique resonates post-election

Posted on December 19, 2024

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in the DC Line here.

Did William Gropper leap into the future, or have we been pulled back into the past? Are we truly progressing as a society, or merely cycling through the same struggles in new forms? Seeing William Gropper: Artist of the People, a recently opened exhibition at The Phillips Collection, in the wake of the tumultuous 2024 presidential election feels less like a journey through history and more like staring into a mirror that reflects our own fractured reality. The content of Gropper’s provocative body of work — spanning painting, political cartoons and printmaking — remains strikingly relevant today. This 20th-century artist never softened his message to appease sensibilities or prioritize aesthetics. Instead, his art is deliberately unsettling, challenging viewers to confront uncomfortable truths about power, inequality, and the moral decay that perpetuates them.

Gropper (1897–1977) was born in New York City to Jewish immigrants. Though he distanced himself from religious Judaism as an adult, he used his art to confront antisemitism and speak out against the Nazi regime and the Holocaust. The death of his aunt in the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire of 1911 sparked his lifelong advocacy for workers’ rights. His bold paintings, prints and cartoons tackled themes of racism, labor exploitation and the rise of fascism. A radical nonconformist even during his art education, Gropper’s dedication to using his craft as a tool for social change earned him the title “Artist of the People.”

Gropper’s approach in his political cartoons is vivid and direct — a kind of accountability rare in any era and increasingly rare today. Rather than resorting to “subs” or subliminal critiques, Gropper would “@” his targets directly if he were around now. His work speaks to our age of social media and polarized politics. Take Travel Companions (1936), where he positions U.S. Rep. William Lemke of North Dakota alongside Adolf Hitler and the antisemitic radio personality Father Coughlin. This is Gropper at his most confrontational, exposing alliances that he saw as challenging the very fabric of democracy. In Lincoln Observing Corrupt Politicians, Silver Shirts, and the KKK (1940), he places President Abraham Lincoln as a silent witness to fascist sympathizers like Coughlin and U.S. Rep. Martin Dies of Texas, his presence a reminder of what’s at stake when power is abused. By the time we reach We’re Just Crazy About Fascism (circa 1940), Gropper strips away all pretense, showing figures like Charles Lindbergh and William Randolph Hearst as unashamed proponents of fascism. The pieces don’t just critique — each one documents the moral battles of his time, giving viewers an unvarnished look at who held power and how they wielded it.

The moral battles of Gropper’s era echo seamlessly into ours, a point the exhibition underscores with insight: “Over half a century since their creation, Gropper’s work exposes universal human concerns, including the fragility of our democracy, which continue to persist,” Phillips Collection director and CEO Jonathan P. Binstock explains in a press release on the exhibition. Yet while strongly conveying Gropper’s timeless themes, the curators miss an opportunity to deepen this relevance. Making clear the contemporary parallels — perhaps by juxtaposing Gropper’s art with recent political cartoons or commentary on today’s authoritarian trends — would make the exhibition even more resonant. It is not enough to just display Gropper’s work. By linking specific works to our current socio-political climate, curators could emphasize the cyclical nature of the issues Gropper confronted, inviting viewers to consider his legacy as an urgent call to action.

One of the exhibition’s standout works, Congressional Declaration (1947), hits at the core of American hypocrisy. The post-World War II cartoon shows two politicians editing the Declaration of Independence, lifting a brush to add exclusions to the tenet of “all men are created equal” — except for “negroes,” “Jews,” “women” and other groups. Published in the magazine New Masses during the Red Scare, this work takes aim at America’s shaky relationship with its founding ideals, exposing how racism, sexism, antisemitism and anti-labor sentiments erode our democratic foundation. As the 2024 election cycle has shown, democracy demands vigilance, and Gropper’s message — that equality and justice are neither self-fulfilling nor self-perpetuating — could not feel more relevant.

Visually, Gropper’s use of black and white heightens his critique, creating images that strike harder than color could. Admittedly driven in many cases by the practicalities of mass printing, the stark contrast in his work reflects a binary Gropper saw between justice and injustice, power and the powerless. The lack of color doesn’t feel like a limitation but a strategic choice, amplifying each line and shadow. In Capriccios (1953–57), a series of 50 lithographs, the absence of color serves as an aesthetic and moral weight, forcing viewers to grapple with his subjects’ grotesque expressions, exaggerated gestures and the shadows that loom large, like the ideologies he opposes. It’s a message for today’s cartoonists: Sometimes, what’s left out speaks louder than what’s included.

The exhibition’s design is equally impactful. Separating Gropper’s monochromatic works from his few color pieces creates a powerful contrast that accentuates the scope of his vision. After immersing ourselves in the severity of black and white, we encounter Construction of the Dam (1938), in which Gropper uses color sparingly yet purposefully. A study for a mural at the U.S. Department of the Interior headquarters, it portrays Black and white workers laboring together on a Works Progress Administration project, an image of unity that stood against the norms of segregation. Here, color doesn’t distract from — it amplifies — Gropper’s vision of inclusion and equality. His rare use of color underscores his critique of an exclusionary society, showing that even mundane choices can carry political weight.

Ultimately, William Gropper: Artist of the People offers more than an art exhibition; it’s a rallying cry that resonates with the urgency of our current political moment. While Oscar Wilde’s essay The Critic as Artist may argue for critique that beautifies, Gropper transforms critique into a demand for justice. His works compel us not only to recognize society’s flaws but to address them — a call that feels especially relevant as we face the divisive climate in the aftermath of the 2024 election. With its unfiltered lines and relentless satire, Gropper’s art wields a lance against complacency, daring us to confront societal failures head-on. This exhibition reminds us: The loudest statements are often made by what’s stripped away.

William Gropper: Artist of the People at The Phillips Collection opened Oct. 17 and continues through Jan. 5. The museum is located at 1600 21st St. NW.

From Murals to Martial Arts: New Smithsonian Exhibit Reflects on Chinatown’s History and Asian American Influence in DC

Posted on November 19, 2024

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in The DC Line here.

At most art museums, visitors typically view and admire the final product, with few opportunities to witness the creative process or the heavy lifting that occurs behind the scenes. However, Sightlines: Chinatown and Beyond, the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center’s first museum exhibition in 10 years, invites viewers on a journey that peels back and examines the multilayered impact Asian Americans have had on the District over many generations. This exploration unfolds through murals, archival documents and martial arts. One leaves with the understanding that while DC’s Chinatown, as it once existed, may have been fleeting, its spirit — the Asian American zeitgeist — remains vibrant.

The exhibit at the Smithsonian American Art Museum consists of three sections: Making Place, Transforming Tradition, and Visualizing Identity. Each section emphasizes “the vital role Asian Americans have played in shaping the communities, landscapes, and cultures in Washington, DC,” according to the Smithsonian. With over 120 artifacts on display, the collection could benefit from some thoughtful curation, trimming down the selection to allow guests to fully engage with the pieces. Despite the overwhelming number of artifacts, a few standout pieces effectively convey the exhibit’s message.

A highlight is the depiction of first-generation Indonesian-American muralist Cita Sadeli, known as “Miss CheLove.” The tools she used to create several murals around the city — painting shoes, aerosol nozzles and crates of spray paint — are more than mere artifacts: They create intimacy and connection with her artistic journey, inviting the viewer to join in her creative process. An especially poignant image, Julian Peterson’s photograph The Artist Working on She Got We (2022) shows Miss CheLove precariously balanced on an aerial lift, painting the word “Enny” onto a design board. This four-letter tribute to her late mother, who emigrated from Indonesia as a Fulbright scholar, serves as a touching reminder of the sacrifices and stories that have shaped Asian American immigrant identity.

Through murals such as Every Day I See Something New (2011), Miss CheLove successfully transforms the streets into a canvas for collective memory, celebrating the richness of diverse voices and reflecting on social movements while incorporating elements of the city’s cultural essence. However, in DC Stands United Against Hate (2020), created in response to George Floyd’s murder, her decision to render this mural in black and white — rather than the vibrant colors typical of graffiti or other street art — raises questions. While the monochromatic palette may convey the solemnity of the subject, it could also allude to the philosophy of colorblindness, which seeks to overlook race but often perpetuates racial inequity.

The bulk of the exhibit focuses primarily on the repeated — but decidedly uneven — “historical efforts to heighten Chinatown’s visibility” even at times of tremendous change and disruption. Due to beautification projects in the National Mall and Federal Triangle areas in the early 1930s, Chinese residents were forcibly relocated from their original neighborhood along Pennsylvania Avenue NW, creating what has long considered DC’s Chinatown, specifically the area along H Street between 5th and 7th streets NW. Later, the construction of Capital One Arena in the 1990s fueled gentrification and led to further displacement of many Chinese residents. In the 2000s, some local business groups unsuccessfully sought to rebrand the area from “Chinatown” to “East End.”

The anchor piece of the exhibition, Terrence Nicholson’s Safety Jacket: A Mourning in Chinatown (2018), reflects the ongoing changes in Chinatown. In this mixed-media work, the African American artist expressed his grief over the eviction of the Wah Sing Kung Fu School by creating a kung fu jacket from martial arts sashes. The jacket’s resemblance to a scarecrow — usually used to keep birds away from crops — invites speculation: Is it meant as a deliberate symbol of protection, loss and deterrence, or is it just a coincidence? The ambiguity adds depth to the narrative of displacement and cultural erosion.

Archival materials, such as a March 1977 document titled “The Chinatown Program — A Progress Report,” and Washington Post clippings published a decade later, highlight the community’s proactive efforts — not merely protests and discussions, but organized meetings with clear agendas and participants invested in Chinatown’s future.

Unfortunately, while exploring a connection that does exist, the Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center’s exhibit crams the topics of Chinatown’s long, hard-fought history and the influence of Asian Americans like Miss CheLove into an unbalanced whole. These two significant topics would benefit from separate explorations, allowing visitors to learn about the impact of Asian Americans in modern times and delve into Chinatown’s past, present and future independently.

That said, the audio-visual elements of the exhibit are truly captivating. The rhythmic drumming of a Chinatown festival band reverberates throughout the space, instilling a sense of urgency and vitality that complements the images of karate chops, kicks and precision movements. These visuals depict the lineage of martial arts practices in Chinatown from the 1930s to today. Rows of trophies from the DC martial arts group Simba Dojang (founded by an African American) illustrate the impact of Chinese martial arts not only within the community but also across different racial groups.

In the end, this exhibition compels us to reflect on the duality of progress and preservation. It reminds us not only of Chinatown’s history but also of the vibrant contributions of Asian Americans like Miss CheLove. Although these topics might better be explored separately, the dynamic interplay of art, history and identity serves as a powerful reminder that the voices and experiences of Asian Americans are not just footnotes in DC history; they are integral to the ongoing shaping and reshaping of the area’s cultural identity.

The Smithsonian Asian Pacific American Center’s exhibition Sightlines: Chinatown and Beyond opened Sept. 7, 2024, and continues through Nov. 25, 2025, at the Smithsonian American Art Museum at 8th and G streets NW.

For Mosaic’s ‘Lady Day,’ Roz White transforms into Billie Holiday in a captivating performance

Posted on September 27, 2024

By Teniola Ayoola

This article was originally published in The DC Line here.

She riffed about parole officers, sang to white audiences about racial injustice, and used cuss words as adjectives — that’s Billie Holiday, compellingly reincarnated with fresh depth and dynamism in Mosaic Theater Company’s production of Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill. Written by Lanie Robertson, the play has been staged on and off Broadway since its 1986 premiere. It now graces Mosaic’s 10th anniversary season under the direction of Reginald L. Douglas, featuring a stellar cast and band.

Before she gained fame as Billie Holiday, she was Eleanora Fagan, born in 1915 to a jazz guitarist father and a teenage mother. Despite a turbulent childhood, Holiday rose to stardom as a jazz singer between 1935 and 1941, touring across the United States without formal technical training or the ability to read music. Faced with legal troubles and periods of incarceration due to drug use, Holiday still went on to become the first Black woman to perform with an all-white band and grew increasingly vocal about social issues and injustices of her time. 

In Lady Day, Roz White, the star of the evening, commands the stage with a charisma that channels Holiday’s legendary presence. From her dramatic entrance — where she misses her cue, makes us wait, and appears only after a fitting introduction and applause — to the final poignant notes, White’s portrayal is magnetic. Dressed to the nines by costume designer Moyenda Kulemeka in a striking white dress with Holiday’s signature elbow-length white gloves, a mink fur stole, and green slingback pumps, she sets the tone for a performance that blends meticulous craftsmanship with raw emotion.

White, known for her roles in Bessie’s Blues at Alexandria’s MetroStage as well as Broadway national tours such as TINA:The Tina Turner Musical and Dreamgirls, has a voice that effortlessly navigates through jazz standards like “What a Little Moonlight Can Do,” “Easy Livin’,” and “T’ain’t Nobody’s Business if I Do.” Her voice showcases both her vocal prowess and deep connection to the material. In “Gimme a Pigfoot (and a Bottle of Beer),” her interaction with the audience — stepping off the stage and engaging directly — adds a visceral, immersive quality to the performance, though one wishes she would have worked more of the room than just the front row. Her rendition of “Strange Fruit” is particularly haunting, with White’s intense gaze and physicality vividly evoking the pain, lynchings and injustice captured in the song’s powerful lyrics.

Douglas selected an ideal actor to bring Robertson’s script to life. Though White sometimes struggles with pacing in her dialogue (lacking the pauses and inflections that convey a natural, in-the-moment flow of thought and speech), she excels in nailing punchlines and holding an audience at rapt attention. Her recounting of Holiday’s personal stories — such as getting her first job, confronting legal troubles and racial discrimination, and receiving news of her father’s death — highlights her ability to weave humor and gravity seamlessly, so much that White gives the impression of being an even better storyteller than she is a singer. 

In the second half of the show, White delves into Holiday’s darker moments with a remarkable authenticity that elicits empathy and reflection. Her portrayal of Holiday in a state of stupor and disarray — marked by slurred speech, staggering movements and near-mishaps — brings a raw quality to the performance. The performance reaches its climax with a poignant rendition of “Deep Song,” featuring the lyrics “I only know misery has to be part of me,” before slowly fading into darkness.

Lighter aspects of this otherwise downcast production include the blues break with standout performances. A five-time Helen Hayes nominee for musical direction, William Knowles (acting the role of Holiday’s accompanist in her later years, Jimmy Powers) plays with masterful dexterity while hunched over the piano. Drummer Greg Holloway delivers a captivating solo on par with bassist Mark Saltman’s earlier one at the start of the show. 

The stage, though compact, is effectively utilized with a masterful set design by Nadir Bey that features a retro “Emerson’s Bar and Grill” sign. The lighting by Jesse Belsky enhances the show’s emotional shifts. 

Overall, Mosaic’s Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill is a memorable tribute to Billie Holiday. Blending powerful performances, evocative storytelling and a richly atmospheric setting, it serves as a reminder of the enduring impact she left on jazz despite the hardships she faced.