The Billie Holiday Theatre presents its mainstage fall presentation for 2020 online with 12 Angry Men . . . and Women: The Weight of the Wait in partnership with The New Press. It will feature select stories from the acclaimed book 12 Angry Men: True Stories of Being a Black Man in America Today (The New Press, 2012), as well as an original story that focuses on the killing of Breonna Taylor.

The staged reading features an award-winning cast, including Lisa Arrindell (The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, Saints & Sinners, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof on Broadway), Billy Eugene Jones (A Soldier’s Play on Broadway and Much Ado About Nothing at Shakespeare in the Park), and Wendell Pierce (Death of a Salesman - London, The Wire, Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan, and Between the World and Me)  with live music by renowned violinist,  Daniel Bernard Roumain and a musical overture performed live by The New York Philharmonic.

12 Angry Men . . . and Women  presents select stories of everyday people subjected to racial profiling, based on The New Press book edited by Gregory S. Parks and Matthew W. Hughey. While accounts of the stinging experience of racial profiling have been passed down as a contemptible legacy to generations of African American men, women, and children, recent high-profile cases have drawn outrage and protests across the country, challenging local and national politicians and law enforcement agencies to acknowledge the urgency of ongoing racial injustices.