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[0:00] Mo Brady: You're listening to The Ensemblist, the only podcast that shows you Broadway from the inside out. Welcome, I'm Mo Brady.

[0:21] Mo Brady: This week I had the chance to speak to Anthony Wayne. With a decade of experience on Broadway as a veteran Ensemblist, he is the creator and one of the co-founders of Black Broadway Men, a new organization that is utilizing social and educational opportunities to strengthen the bond of healing and unity for all Black men both in the Broadway and theater community. We talked about the creation of Black Broadway Men, its mission, and the kind of opportunities they are hoping to create in the future. Here's our conversation.

[1:09] Mo Brady: So would you introduce yourself and tell us where you're calling from today?

[1:15] Anthony Wayne: My name is Anthony Wayne and I'm calling from Harlem, New York City.

[1:19] Mo Brady: So tell us, what is Black Broadway Men?

[1:23] Anthony Wayne: Black Broadway Men is a nonprofit organization that's set to support and create a safe space for Black men in the Broadway and theater community to be able to speak, to connect, to support each other, and to love on each other, basically. There are three principles that we have, which are unity, strength, and legacy. We say it's creating unity, finding strength, embracing legacy, and being the creator as well as one of the co-founders because I felt the need to connect to other Black men in the Broadway community. Being mostly ensemble in my career, what I've been doing, I've been able to connect with a bunch of people in different shows, as well as perform in incredible places, but most of the spaces I was pretty much the only one.

And when I moved to New York to perform, I realized that most of the men that I performed with and auditioned with, I was always in competition with, especially Black men. And so the only time that we were able to really have connections was either if we were in a show together, or if we were doing an event together. And you know, it takes the work to actually create friendships and relationships. So if you feel like doing the work, then it happens, but when you don't, it doesn't happen. And so you create to build this disconnect within your own community. A lot of people don't understand what it's like to be the only one. When you go into a room of a new show, everyone's there and everyone's excited and everybody's loving up on each other and having a good time. But most of the people there don't realize that you feel alone. Black Broadway men creates that space for us to be able to come together and support each other, to speak about how we really feel.

[3:03] Mo Brady: Like you said, this is based on an experience, a feeling that you've had being in competition, separated from other Black Broadway men. Certainly an idea that you've had for a long time. Tell us about going from idea to having the balls to turn it into something to share with the world.

[3:22] Anthony Wayne: It's funny you said that because I definitely had certain fears of stepping out and making this happen. I'm a spiritual person. I really make sure that I listen to my inside, listen to my heart, listen to what it is that God wants me to do. And so I feel like I was fortunate enough to have thought about this even back in 2016. I remember going from being in the first national of Color Purple to being Richie in the Chorus Line. And so I began to connect with James Lane and he and I would find times that we would just talk and I would find myself connecting with other men, like just a bunch of other gentlemen that I've seen around that I've also respected and appreciated. And for years, even being in certain shows, especially Color Purple, I've always looked up to these men.

And now my career has led itself to become colleagues of mine and for us to really appreciate each other. So from that idea and from that spirit, I've been able to really just take the time to suss out what it is that I wanted to do with these men and how I wanted to connect in some type of way. And I remember being on the phone with Ken Page and having a long conversation with him. And I said, wow, man, I really need to connect these Black men in some type of way. I just built up the courage to just do it. I think that's more what it is. You just build up the courage to just do it. Of course, you look at everybody else and you wonder what else that they're doing and you get caught up in that stuff.

But if you don't really just take the reins and do the work to figuring out what it is you want to do, then that's how you make it happen. I think to myself, especially as a leader, when I first started doing the legal work of Black Broadway Men, it was like the fall of 2019. It was before all of this stuff started happening. And about February, I decided to just move forward and make it happen. As I spoke to Terrence Archie, as I spoke to Sir Brock Warren, I decided to bring them together in one place. So we just had a meeting with James, and we all just talked. And from that conversation came the evolution of what it was that we're going to be doing.

[5:32] Mo Brady: Your motto is this three pronged statement, creating unity, finding strength, embracing legacy. Can you unpack those three statements? Like, what do each of them mean to you? And why are they important?

[5:45] Anthony Wayne: Unity is about coming together. Because like I said, a lot of times we don't have the time or make the time to really spend time with each other. We don't make the time to spend with our family because we're so caught up in the business. Being able to unify even with our families is difficult. It's even harder for us as Black men in the Broadway community to unify. So I think that's more where it comes from. And I think it also deals with you unifying with yourself. Finding the tools that you need to identify, to build within yourself, to be great. Even though we depend on our talent and we depend on our look and what people think about us and how we make them feel, we don't realize that we pour so much out to everyone else.

We're really excited about working with Black Theatre United and Black Theatre Coalition as well as Broadway Advocacy Coalition. Just those things that are already out that we can become a part of as well as Black women on Broadway. So we're really happy to be able to join the ranks with them and to do things and unify to find that strength within ourselves. Strength we're able to deal with that because now we can do it from the inside out. We can actually work on the mental and the emotional part of it so that we can become greater and stronger within ourselves in order to figure out the tools that we need in order to move forward. Because I think that's really the key as opposed to seeing what you want to do is figuring out how you're going to do it.

And then legacy has to deal with the people who have come before us that we know that we stand on the shoulders of that can support us and we can now, we're the legacy that we're going to create for those behind us. And so as we do that, we find ourselves becoming stronger within ourselves to become a unit to become stronger for the world.

[7:30] Mo Brady: So you talked about first going through the steps to become a non-profit last fall, you know, February. How do you take this idea of something that should exist in the world and manifest it?

[7:43] Anthony Wayne: I really think the work that we've been doing over the past four or five months has been helpful because we've been able to actually connect and figure out the why. You know, why do we want to be connected? What is really the issue that we have with each other and with ourselves? And that's the work that we've been doing within ourselves. You know, as we collect other Black men across the country to connect with those conversations, we will find a unity and a connection so that we'll be able to stand strong and be our own entity so that we can have a voice and we can be supportive to other things. And our motto is every Black man in theater is a Black Broadway man. And we make that statement because every time, especially us on Broadway, it becomes so inclusive.

Many people are talented, especially Black men across the country and across the world. They've never had the opportunity to be on Broadway, but that doesn't make them any less of a Black Broadway man. That doesn't mean that they don't go through the same issues or the same problems or the same situations that we go through. It just so happens that we're on Broadway. And I think it also keeps them motivated to know that we are just like you. And when you come here, know you have a support system. We're going to have other sessions that have to do with mental health, which is what we did last Saturday. We're going to do another one for dealing with sexuality, or then another one dealing with finances and things of that nature.

Just all the things that I feel like we need to have to just become stronger as Black men together. And in the interim, we find ourselves creating a brotherhood. So I consider it to be like a fraternal brotherhood of some type of way. And I think it's always been like that, but now we can actually put a name to it. And I'm grateful that Black Broadway Men is something that's now out there for young people to see. I remember being a young man in Norfolk, Virginia, trying, you know, dancing, kicking my leg, singing The Wiz, watching my little VHS. Little did I know that someone named Adrian Bailey was on that screen. And now he's a close colleague of mine. And to know that he's connected to Black Broadway Men, and we're friends, and we can talk and connect, means the world.

[9:58] Mo Brady: How can other Black men in the theater find out more about you, join you for future events, and become part of this legacy?

[10:07] Anthony Wayne: You just go to blackbroadwaymen.org, and there'll be a little thing that says Visitors and Black Broadway Men, and you click Join. And once you join, it'll take you to the Facebook page, the Members page that we have. So that's how I would say, if there was any man, any Black man in theater, whether it's an actor, singer, dancer, musician, crew member, lighting designer, set designer, costume designer, makeup designer, hair designer, everybody, everybody, all Black men who are in theater are included across the country, not just Broadway men, everybody. So we're excited about being able to have those conversations with them all.

[10:49] Mo Brady: Special thanks to Anthony Wayne for sharing his stories with us today. The Ensemblist was produced today by Jackson Klein and me, Mo Brady. There are two great ways you could be helping The Ensemblist right now. One is by leaving us a rating and review on Apple Podcasts, and the second is by becoming a Patreon member, which you can do at patreon.com slash The Ensemblist. Please follow us wherever you listen to podcasts, on Spotify, on Apple Podcasts, or at bpn.fm, the home of Broadway Podcast Network. You can also follow us on Instagram. Thanks for listening. Until next time.