FEATURED ARTICLES

Harvey Williams, Founder and Executive Director of KC Melting Pot

Theatre (KCMPT) in Kansas City announced that Dr. Nicole Hodges

Persley has been appointed as Artistic Director. After three years as

Associate Artistic Director, Hodges Persley has helped to position

KCMPT as a theater company to watch in the Kansas City regional the-

ater landscape. Under her creative influence, the company has pro-

duced timely and thought-provoking shows such as the revivals of

Angelina W. Grimke’s 1916 anti-lynching play Rachel and Amiri

Baraka’s 1964 Obie award-winning play Dutchman as well as cutting

edge new American voices such as Pulitzer Prize winner Dominique

Morriseau and emerging playwright Lewis J. Morrow. Hodges Persley

draws season inspiration from an eclectic array of sources from his-

toric social and arts movements to #Black Lives Matter and African

American music genres.

“Nicole has made quite an impression on the KCMPT family and com-

munity. We did not need to have a search process because her artistic

vision is leading us to develop new audiences by giving them diverse

representations of American theater that speak to multiple genera-

tions,” said Williams. “KCMPT is one of the cornerstones of community

outreach and artistic opportunity for artists of color in Kansas City.

Nicole brings a dynamic personality, knowledge of African American

history and clear vision that can help us incubate emerging artists of

color. The Board of KCMPT is excited to have her at the artistic helm

because she dreams big. Under her artistic vision, we are now bring-

ing revivals and new works to our audiences adding to our vision to

develop the voices of Kansas City’s playwrights of color.”

"I am honored to accept the Artistic Director position at KCMPT,” said

Hodges Persley “I feel the performers and production team at KCMPT

are some of the best in the city. We are the ‘little train that could’ and

we just keep on going and growing each year. I look forward to leading

the artistic vision of this extraordinary collective as we forge new

models of sustainability that highlight the importance of theater as a

space to reimagine a more inclusive American theater narrative. We

have so many artists that want to be seen and heard. At KCMPT, we

showcase voices and stories by artist of color that need to be heard by

everyone. All of our lives depend on it.”

“The promotion of Nicole Hodges Persley to Artistic Director at KC

Melting Pot Theatre is good news,” said Susan Kysela, Board Member,

KCMPT. “As Associate Artistic Director over the last three years, she

brings a high level of professional experience to everything she has a

hand in. She's hardworking and dedicated to the success of this the-

ater. This is a welcome development.”

About Nicole Hodges Persley

Nicole Hodges Persley is an award-winning Associate Professor of

Theatre and the Associate Dean of Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion at

the University of Kansas. An artist-scholar, Hodges Persley creates in-

tentional bridges between the entertainment industry and academia.

Hodges Persley has served as the Associate Artistic Director of KCMPT

from 2015 to 2018. She was the founder and former Co-Artistic

Director of Mountaintop Players in Los Angeles from 1997-2000 which

produced Emmy winner Stephen Mc Feelys’ Now Leaving Gate 20. Her

directing credits span venues on both coasts including Highways

Performance space, The Complex and The Hudson Theatre and PS. 122.

She founded the ‘Rep and Rev’ Play Reading series which she co-pro-

duced with Glenn North at The Gem Theater in partnership with the

Kansas City Jazz Museum. Her notable directing credits in Kansas City

include critically acclaimed productions of Lorraine Hansberry’s A

Raisin in the Sun, Dominique Morriseau’s Sunset Baby, Kristoffer

Diaz’s Welcome to Arroyo’s, Amiri Baraka’s Dutchman and Angelina W.

Grimke’s Rachel. Hodges Persley is a specialist in African American

theater and performance and has published articles and book chapters

on Hip-Hop culture, African and African American theater, Black popu-

lar culture, and sampling in American Theatre magazine, Theatre

Journal, Theatre Topics, Palimpsest, and Stage Director and

Choreographers Journal. Her forthcoming book, Sampling and

Remixing Blackness in Hip Hop Performance explores the influence of

Hip-hop and African American culture on the artistic practices of per-

forming artists in the United States and England. She is a member of

SAG/AFTRA, Stage Directors and Choreographers Society and National

Theatre Conference board member.