Round House Theatre kicks off its 2024-2025 season with an acclaimed Nigerian-American drama, Sojourners, written by Mfoniso Udofia and the first play in her nine-part Ufot Cycle. Directed by Valerie Curtis-Newton, Sojourners is a testament of the complexity of the American Dream through the lens of Nigerian culture.
Abasiama and her husband Ukpong are Nigerian immigrants studying and living in Texas in the 1970s. Ukpong is exhilarated by the promises of America, but Abasiama is homesick and frustrated by Ukpong’s frequent absences. As Abasiama struggles with the physical pain of her pregnancy, the demands of work and schooling, the isolation of being away from her family, and the uncertainty of her future, an unexpected community inspires her to forge her own path. The first play in Mfoniso Udofia’s epic nine-part Ufot Cycle depicting the Nigerian-American experience, Sojourners is a “moving and powerful” (The New York Times) testament to the complexity of the American dream.
“We’re ecstatic to kick off the 2024-2025 season with Mfoniso Udofia’s Sojourners,” says
Artistic Director Ryan Rilette. “Mfoniso’s 9-play Ufot Cycle is one of the most ambitious, epic, and thrilling things happening in American theater today. We are excited to officially introduce the cycle with Sojourners, the origin story, after developing Adia & Clora Snatch Joy, one of the later plays, in our National Capital New Play Festival in 2023. We have also commissioned another of the Cycle plays, so we expect that Sojourners will be the first of many Mfoniso plays that you will see at Round House in the coming years.”
“I’m so excited to work on Mfoniso’s beautiful play,” says Director Valerie Curtis-Newton. Sojourners is a story about an immigrant, Abasiama, who is caught in the tug-of-war between loyalty to Nigeria and the lure of the American Dream. We are asking to imagine the feeling of stepping off a plane in a new country. Everything is unfamiliar. So different from your expectations. Everything is part real and part illusion, just like the life she was promised. Abasiama learns that the world is taut and full of dualities: Dreams vs. Reality; Freedom vs. Encumbrance; and Duty vs. Choice. She must discover her own way – combining the old ways and the new.”
The brilliant cast includes Opa Adeyemo (The First Deep Breath at Geffen Playhouse), Renea S. Brown (The Mountaintop and Nollywood Dreams at Round House Theatre), Kambi Gathesha (What to Send Up When it Goes Down at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and The Bakkhai at Baltimore Center Stage), and Billie Krishawn (Metamorphoses at Folger Theatre and Angels in America at Arena Stage).
The cast is joined by a dynamic creative team, which includes Scenic Designer Paige Hathaway, Costume Designer Ivania Stack, Lighting Designer Porche McGovern, Sound Designer Kenny Neal, Properties Coordinator Chelsea Dean, Dialect Coach Dawn-Elin Fraser, Casting Director Sarah Cooney, Dramaturg Naysan Mojgani, and Production Stage Manager Jazzy Davis.
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Mfoniso Udofia (Playwright) is a first-generation Nigerian-American storyteller and educator. She attended Wellesley College and obtained her MFA from the American Conservatory Theater [ACT]. While at ACT, she co-pioneered The Nia Project, which provided artistic outlets for San Francisco youth.
Followed by the 2024 production of Sojourners at Round House Theatre, both of her plays,
Sojourners and The Grove, will be produced by the Huntington Theatre in 2024-2025.
Sojourners, Runboyrun, Her Portmanteau, and In Old Age have been seen at New York Theatre Workshop, American Conservatory Theater, Playwrights Realm, Magic Theater, National Black Theatre, Strand Theater, and Boston Court. She’s the recipient of the 2021 Horton Foote Award, the 2017 Helen Merrill Playwright Award, the 2017-18 McKnight National Residency and Commission, and is a member of New Dramatists.
Mfoniso is currently commissioned by the Huntington Theatre, Round House Theatre, Hartford Stage, Denver Center, ACT, and South Coast Repertory. Her plays have been developed by Manhattan Theatre Club, ACT, McCarter Theatre, OSF, New Dramatists, Berkeley Rep’s Ground Floor, Hedgebrook, Sundance, Space on Ryder Farm, and more.
Since 2018, Mfoniso has been working extensively in television. She has written on such
acclaimed shows as 13 Reasons Why on Netflix; A League of Their Own on Amazon; Let the
Right One In on Showtime; and Pachinko (Peabody Award), Little America, and Lessons in Chemistry (WGA Nomination), all on Apple TV+. She has also developed films for HBO,
Legendary, and Amazon.
Valerie Curtis Newton (Director) Bio will be available on RoundHouseTheatre.org in the coming weeks.
CAST INFORMATION (ALPHABETICAL)
Opa Adeyemo (Ukpong) is a graduate from the Juilliard School of Drama. He recently starred in The First Deep Breath at Geffen Playhouse under the direction of Steven H. Broadnax. He shot a supporting role on one of the final episodes of The Good Fight and starred in the short film The Extenders, directed by Derrick Sanders. When he’s not working on plays or for the camera, you can find him with your ears. Opa loves the art of song and is working day in and out to share this love with the world.
Renea S. Brown (Moxie) is excited to return to Round House Theatre after winning the Helen Hayes Award for Outstanding Performer in a Play as Camae in The Mountaintop! Previous Round House credits include Dede in Nollywood Dreams. DC credits include Metamorphoses, Our Verse in Time to Come, and A Midsummer Night’s Dream at Folger Theatre; Tempestuous Elements and Change Agent at Arena Stage; The Tempest and Macbeth at Shakespeare Theatre Company; Love Factually at The Kennedy Center; and Romeo and Juliet and Macbeth at Chesapeake Shakespeare Theatre Company; Regional credits include The Wolves at McCarter Theatre; Othello, Sense and Sensibility, and Twelfth Night at Island Shakespeare Festival; and Much Ado About Nothing and A King and No King at American Shakespeare Center. MFA: Academy of Classical Acting.
Kambi Gathesha (Disciple) is making his Round House Theatre debut. DC area credits
include What to Send Up When it Goes Down at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company and The Bakkhai at Baltimore Center Stage. Broadway credits include The Music Man, where he served as assistant to choreographer Warren Carlyle. Off-Broadway credits include What to Send Up When it Goes Down at Playwrights Horizons, the Public, and ART New York. Regional credits include Mlima’s Tale at Repertory Theatre of St. Louis and Big Love at Williamstown Theatre Festival. Film and television credits include the Amazon Prime series Big Dogs.
Billie Krishawn (Abasiama) is a multi-disciplinary artist, activist-advocate, and two-time Helen Hayes Award winner. Recent credits include Metamorphoses at Folger Theatre; The Sensational Sea Mink–ettes at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company; The Till Trilogy at Mosaic Theater Company; Angels in America at Arena Stage; JUMP at Everyman Theatre; Blood at the Root at Theatre Alliance; The Joy That Carries You at Olney Theatre; Until the Flood at Studio Theatre; HERstory at The Kennedy Center; Melancholy Play at Constellation Theatre; Airness with 1st Stage and Keegan Theatre; and Something Moving at Ford’s Theatre. Television credits include Water in a Broken Glass on Prime Video.
Sojourners runs September 11-October 6 at Round House Theatre, 4545 East-West Highway, Bethesda, MD (one block from Bethesda Metro station). Performances are Tuesday through Thursday at 7:30 pm, Friday and Saturday at 8:00 pm, and Saturday and Sunday at 2:00 pm. Tickets can be purchased by calling 240.644.1100, visiting the box office, or online.
ABOUT ROUND HOUSE THEATRE
Round House Theatre is one of the leading professional theaters in the Washington, DC area, producing a season of new plays, modern classics, and musicals for more than 50,000 patrons each year at its theater in Bethesda. Round House has been nominated for 227 Helen Hayes Awards and has won 52, including four Outstanding Resident Play Awards and the Charles MacArthur Award for Original New Play in 2016. Round House’s lifelong learning and education programs serve more than 5,000 students each year at its Education Center in Silver Spring, in schools throughout Montgomery County, and at its Bethesda theater. Cornerstone programs include Free Play, which provides free tickets for students ages 13-college, the Teen Performance Company, which culminates in the student-produced Sarah Metzger Memorial Play, Summer Camp for students in grades K-12, and a full slate of classes for adults and youth.
