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[0:00] Mary Dina: Hey everyone, welcome to Page to Stage.

[0:03] Brian Sedita: A conversation with theater makers.

[0:05] Mary Dina: We're your hosts.

[0:05] Brian Sedita: That's Brian.

[0:06] Mary Dina: And that's Mary.

[0:07] Brian Sedita: This episode is part of our series on Chicken and Biscuits, a new play by Douglas Lyons.

[0:13] Mary Dina: In this series, we uncover the process behind the play through our central question.

[0:17] Brian Sedita: How has this play fed your soul?

[0:19] Mary Dina: We hope you enjoyed this episode.

[0:25] Toni R. Isreal: Hi, my name is Toni R. Isreal, Realemn Productions. We are experts in BIPOC marketing and press.

[0:32] Toni R. Isreal: And we work on Broadway shows along with cultural institutions.

[0:36] Toni R. Isreal: We're really excited to speak with you about your process working on Chicken and Biscuits specifically.

[0:42] Brian Sedita: But I think we're also gonna try and cover some broad questions that we had about your production company before we go into Chicken and Biscuits.

[0:51] Mary Dina: So I'd love to know what inspired you to launch your own marketing and PR agency. What was the initiative behind that and specifically with the work that you're trying to do?

[0:59] Toni R. Isreal: Okay, so it is a very long story, but I'm gonna make this short. Um, introduced to Broadway at a young age.

[1:05] Toni R. Isreal: Um, my mom took me to my first Broadway show. I fell in love with it.

[1:10] Toni R. Isreal: I tell the story, that's when Broadway chose me. Um, I didn't take that route as far as schooling.

[1:15] Toni R. Isreal: Um, I come from a financial background, but always loved the arts.

[1:19] Toni R. Isreal: So through church, through church with prayer, through prayer with different theaters, um, along that road, and I do feel when you're on that right path, you go that way, and it becomes very easy to you.

[1:33] Toni R. Isreal: Um, Broadway came back and got me, even out of the financial institution.

[1:37] Toni R. Isreal: And you'll hear my friends say, um, they always knew I would take this path because I was always organizing something.

[1:45] Toni R. Isreal: Um, it was always something.

[1:48] Toni R. Isreal: So when Broadway um presented itself to me through again, through a lot of prayer and through God, met the right people at the right time, and those doors were open.

[1:59] Toni R. Isreal: So I credit um Myra Isaacs, who is one of the lead producers of Hadestown on Broadway.

[2:06] Toni R. Isreal: We um, I'll use the word we found each other at McCarter Theater, which they are still a client of ours.

[2:12] Toni R. Isreal: And then also through Donna Walker Keune, who really honed my um skills and really pushed me to everything that I know today.

[2:23] Toni R. Isreal: And I started out as an intern there, ended up being her marketing director, and then branched out on my own.

[2:23] Mary Dina: I really love that you said that Broadway found me. Because no one says that, you know, because it is having framed the question of like, how did you stumble into this, or like how did you find this to be your career?

[2:38] Toni R. Isreal: And yeah, I was a young, young child.

[2:41] Toni R. Isreal: It really did. I was looking at the lights, I was looking at everything, and I was like, oh my God, you could come and see this all the time.

[2:47] Toni R. Isreal: And I had to be about, I'm thinking of age, I had to be about eight.

[2:51] Toni R. Isreal: And I was like, this is fascinating.

[2:54] Toni R. Isreal: This is absolutely fascinating, and I was hooked.

[2:57] Brian Sedita: Amazing.

[2:58] Brian Sedita: Well, I have to say, just digging through your website, your production company's website, you're working with some of my not only favorite shows, but organizations, just to list a few here.

[3:07] Brian Sedita: I mean, New York Theatre Workshop, The Apollo, McCarter, as you mentioned, then like MJ the Musical, Hadestown, and Chicken and Biscuits, of course.

[3:15] Brian Sedita: Um, so at this point in your journey, kind of like jumping to present day, how are you booking clients?

[3:21] Toni R. Isreal: Are you seeking them out?

[3:23] Toni R. Isreal: Um, are they seeking you out at this point just because of word of mouth is very powerful as we know in the industry?

[3:28] Toni R. Isreal: Is there anything that you would want to share with anyone listening who wants to go out on their own?

[3:34] Toni R. Isreal: Absolutely.

[3:34] Toni R. Isreal: I will always say have mentors.

[3:37] Toni R. Isreal: Um, Donna and Myra are still my forever mentors.

[3:41] Toni R. Isreal: That's what I have coined them as.

[3:43] Toni R. Isreal: Um, happy to state that the clients seek us out.

[3:46] Toni R. Isreal: We don't seek them out.

[3:47] Toni R. Isreal: They seek us out.

[3:47] Toni R. Isreal: It is through word of mouth.

[3:49] Toni R. Isreal: I do feel that in this line of work, especially in entertainment, it's such a small field and everyone knows each other.

[3:55] Toni R. Isreal: You do good work, it goes and it passes on.

[3:58] Toni R. Isreal: So people will come after you.

[4:00] Toni R. Isreal: And learning under Donna Walker Keune, um, we call her the OG of marketing, um, BIPOC marketing.

[4:07] Toni R. Isreal: So learned a lot of people.

[4:09] Toni R. Isreal: People got to know um me through her, through the Apollo Theater, and again, they seek you out.

[4:16] Toni R. Isreal: They do.

[4:16] Brian Sedita: So you mentioned that you also work in film and TV.

[4:19] Brian Sedita: Are there specific things, uh, before we do dive into your process for a theater-based uh process?

[4:24] Brian Sedita: Are there specific things that are different between how you might market for film and TV versus theater?

[4:29] Toni R. Isreal: Bigger budget.

[4:31] Toni R. Isreal: Kind of market the same way, bigger budget, just theater.

[4:35] Toni R. Isreal: You do theater because you love it.

[4:37] Toni R. Isreal: Film, uh, TV projects are much larger, so you can play around with different realms of TV, radio, um, you know, more frequency, so much larger budgets, but it's the same process.

[4:51] Brian Sedita: Do you find um that one avenue, bigger budget, smaller budget, would lead you to be more creative in the marketing process?

[5:00] Toni R. Isreal: Very good question.

[5:01] Toni R. Isreal: We love theater, the team.

[5:03] Toni R. Isreal: Um, we're 14 strong now.

[5:05] Toni R. Isreal: We love the grassroots of it.

[5:07] Toni R. Isreal: Um, we love digging into what the show is about and pulling that marketing from there.

[5:13] Toni R. Isreal: So every show has a specific market.

[5:16] Toni R. Isreal: Every show has a different way of marketing.

[5:18] Toni R. Isreal: You see the concept of the show and then you delve in that way.

[5:21] Toni R. Isreal: We always used um, we coined a phrase we don't do cookie cutter marketing.

[5:26] Toni R. Isreal: So Chicken and Biscuits is marketed to a different audience than Hadestown would be.

[5:30] Toni R. Isreal: So it's finding that niche and then going with it from there.

[5:34] Mary Dina: So how and when did you join the Chicken and Biscuits team?

[5:38] Toni R. Isreal: Um, again through relationships, Hunter Arnold, um, which is the lead producer.

[5:43] Toni R. Isreal: So you joined for the Broadway production.

[5:45] Toni R. Isreal: You weren't a part of it at all for Queen's Theater.

[5:48] Toni R. Isreal: We was approached by Hunter Arnold, and then um we knew Pamela and E. Clayton, and we met Leah, those are the four lead producers of Chicken and Biscuits.

[5:57] Toni R. Isreal: So Hunter was like this, we want you on the team.

[6:00] Toni R. Isreal: So we really didn't have a choice.

[6:02] Toni R. Isreal: He chose us, and it was like we were on board.

[6:05] Brian Sedita: Yeah, so relationships, all about relationships.

[6:07] Mary Dina: So and and what did they come to you and pitch the show as, and then how do you develop what your role is going to be on the production?

[6:15] Toni R. Isreal: And what is your specific role on Chicken and Biscuits?

[6:18] Toni R. Isreal: It's always good when you have a production of color that your team makes up that.

[6:24] Toni R. Isreal: So we are those BIPOC experts, so Black Indigenous People of Color, which Black being first because it's a Black production, and you talk to audiences differently.

[6:35] Toni R. Isreal: So when you have someone that's talking to, let's say the general public, you talk to them different than you talk to a Black audience, if that makes sense.

[6:44] Brian Sedita: Yeah, definitely.

[6:45] Brian Sedita: Well, because I was wondering, like if anybody's looking at the billing, you know, it there are multiple agencies that are working in Chicken and Biscuits, and you guys are doing the BIPOC marketing.

[6:54] Brian Sedita: So I think that's just so fascinating.

[6:56] Brian Sedita: And kudos to the creative team for and the producers for stepping up and saying we are going to put somebody forward that can give a voice to what we're what we want in the theater and what's on stage.

[7:09] Toni R. Isreal: Absolutely.

[7:09] Toni R. Isreal: Absolutely.

[7:10] Toni R. Isreal: It's the first time, truthfully, I've been exposed to seeing that maybe it's just because we're working on this series.

[7:16] Mary Dina: Okay.

[7:16] Mary Dina: Um, it's great to see that that's happening.

[7:20] Brian Sedita: Do you find that this is something that has always been around pre-pandemic?

[7:25] Brian Sedita: Because the conversations during the pandemic were very uh centered around racial injustices and making sure that everybody's voice is heard.

[7:32] Toni R. Isreal: Yes.

[7:33] Toni R. Isreal: Do you find that now coming out of the pandemic, things have shifted in terms of the work that you're doing for something like this?

[7:40] Toni R. Isreal: That's a two-part question.

[7:41] Toni R. Isreal: So I'm gonna answer the first part.

[7:42] Toni R. Isreal: First part, definitely beforehand, it's all in relationships that you have with the producers.

[7:47] Toni R. Isreal: Some producers, I hate to say lean more towards having an open room, open conversations with people of color, and they will seek out to make sure that somebody is of color that's on their team.

[8:01] Toni R. Isreal: That's one pre-pandemic. Now, all that has happened in the we're still in a pandemic, in the reckoning that we say that happened with Broadway, more people are aware that there should be more people of color in the room. And still, that's kudos to the producers who make sure that there's people of color in the room. Um, I'm curious with the beginning conversations that you were having with Hunter and the team, and I'm assuming Douglas was a part of that. I mean, as the playwright and you know, creating that world, and also just knowing him, and we you know, we've had him on the podcast already, just knowing how amazing and just how passionate and he was like tunnel vision of like what exactly was very clear about what he wanted of how he saw the world of the play, but also the world in the audience and like what the potential was there.

[8:52] Toni R. Isreal: So from a more I mean, just generally speaking, from a marketing perspective, and then even further, as you know, as you're focusing your target audience as BIPOC audiences now what were those conversations like I mean were was there a lot of just like throw throw anything to the wall to see what sticks or did were there very clear guidelines or ideas that were brought to the table. There was a mixture of both proud to say with this production. It was such an open dialogue just coming into the room where they had rehearsals where you see the concept and then once you go to a reading where you really hear it and can see it, you then your marketing hat comes on.

[9:31] Toni R. Isreal: So you know it was about a church you go ooh could be good for church audiences. You hear the um you kind of hear the rhythm of it and you go oh yeah you can reach out to women organizations you know you can reach out to sister groups so it's seeing the production and then honing in on what like you said use the word what will stick um so we knew right away I think I think it might have been Douglas who called it the chapel and we was like this I like that that's cute. So it's like we come to the chapel because the whole show is set in a church. So it it just works. So you kind of just get a theme and you you run with it. You kind of see what sticks on the wall this one was a no-brainer um you could really see it after the first rehearsal you knew what you wanted to go after.

[10:15] Toni R. Isreal: And how are you putting some of these items to action and which team members of the chicken and biscuits team are you working with on a day-to-day basis? Mostly we work with press folks um just because you're moving the cast, and you know, we're in a pandemic, it's not you can't really move them the way we would want to. Um, so there's a lot of things that's virtual that we're doing, but there were things that we did in the theaters. There's certain things that we did that we wanted to make it a church experience.

[10:47] Toni R. Isreal: So we use things like um we had folks that we paid to be ushers. So when they came into the theater, they were like it was like you was going to church, you saw the ushers. The ushers had the hard candy, and then the hard candy was very much a black church experience. And then it was um, you know, the singing. So we did WBLS, which is a staple in um New York with black radio. So we wanted that voice to be heard because when you hear um a gospel programming, it was like, yes, that's the voice that you wanted. So it was bringing the church experience um to the team.

[11:24] Toni R. Isreal: So I would say, yeah, press is probably so vivacity through press, we work with them a lot. Um, we reached out to different people in the um church field um or in the churches, we wanted to get them to the show, you know, get the pastors to the church, you know, get the congregations to the church, things like that. So those were fun, and we work a lot with those. So, you know, when you're working with black publications, if you move in the church field, you usually can get folks there.

[11:49] Toni R. Isreal: So that's nice. I do some things in marketing, but in terms of outreach and then like community engagement, that's always been something I've never fully been able to grasp. So I'm really curious how so you mentioned like some of like the New York churches or some New York groups, but if you're looking to extend beyond, I mean, the the world of chicken and biscuits takes place in Connecticut, right? So, how are you able to either one extend to the communities um in Connecticut or even just beyond New York or the tri-state area?

[12:19] Toni R. Isreal: I will say this. This is a shout out to the real amend team. Um, we have a phenomenal reach. Um, so not only do we do New York, we do I'm from New Jersey, so there's a lot of real amendment team and there's team yeah yeah team members that are from New Jersey. So besides that we have Philadelphia we have Connecticut we have Boston we have Virginia you know we go up and down 95. So we reach out to all of those places.

[12:47] Toni R. Isreal: We have churches that you know we go to regularly to go visit. So they come to to shows in droves by the busload so that's how we keep those clients up and we always talk to them through eblast through um you know social media is large so we're in constant contact with them. So when we get shows like this we reach out to them right away. So we try to bring them in. And you know during the pandemic you know international travel is you know just coming back so we really had to reach out to folks that were in the surrounding areas people who could jump in a car or you know take that quick bus ride.

[13:24] Brian Sedita: Right. I didn't even think about the like in when you don't have shows like the communication that you know and the the the care and like the touch if you will that you still have to do when there isn't anything happening or in between like in moments. So that that's that's fascinating.

[13:39] Toni R. Isreal: And we have an awesome um audience development team shout out to them so Richard Pelzer um he leads our audience development um Dana Moorhead and then also Steline Howard um they are phenomenal and really getting us out there with that grassroots then we have a social media digital person Kirsten Stevens so she's really you know gears up our social aspect too.

[14:02] Toni R. Isreal: And then we have two managing directors, so Teresa and Janetta. I could go on and on. We have four team strong. So with marketing, there's always a target audience. And do you think that that target audience or or should it change over the course of a run so that you're not only hitting who maybe it was originally written to have see the play, but then hitting people then and expanding that audience so that everyone comes to see it.

[14:30] Toni R. Isreal: Yes. It depends on the show. Um, how you reach that target audience because every show is not for everybody. You want everybody to see every show, but there's people who we feel will be drawn towards chicken and biscuits, and then we feel people that would be darn drawn towards other shows that we do, but we want them to see everything.

[14:48] Toni R. Isreal: So there's a thing um we use called ambassadors influencers. So we want those people to champion for us. You s give them tickets to the show, they you know, social media they'll hit, they'll post pictures, you know. We want them to bring people back to see the show, so those will be our ambassadors, and then you have influencers, people who you know have thousands upon thousands of followers. You know, they put it on their social media, people be like, Oh, this person is seeing it. I think I'll go see it because this person see it. So we we try to touch in every way.

[15:22] Brian Sedita: Thanks everyone for listening to this episode of Page to Stage. This episode is part one of a two part episode with today's guest. Check back next week for part two. To keep up with us, you can find us on Instagram and Facebook at Page2Stage Podcast. Until next time. That's Brian. That's Mary. We'll see you later.