An Open Letter To Fellow Lovers Of Hip-Hop Theater

The second annual “I Got Five On It” campaign

Below is a letter from Kristoffer Diaz, writer of Welcome to Arroyo’s, a play presented at the 2005 NYC Hip-Hop Theater Festival. He is a 2008 recipient of the Future Aesthetics Artist Regrant, a Van Lier Fellow, a member of the Dramatists Guild, and a longtime friend of HHTF.

In 2005, my play Welcome to Arroyo’s was presented at the Hip-Hop Theater Festival.  We did a one night only production of the play in the downstairs space at New York Theatre Workshop. But HHTF’s presence in my life neither started nor ended that night in the summer of 2005.

Earlier that year, the same cast had performed the show in a Barebones production at The Lark Play Development Center, co-produced by HHTF.  A few months before that, HHTF hosted a developmental workshop for the piece, allowing me to begin realizing my dream of integrating live DJs and MCs (the incomparable Hillel Meltzel and Utkarsh Ambudkar, under the watchful eye and ear of DJ O) into the world I had put together on the page. This all was the first real experience I had had with seeing my words physically manifested on a stage, so to say I’m grateful to Clyde, Kamilah, Danny, and the rest of the Hip-Hop Theater Festival family is a little bit of an understatement.

Going back even further, my first introduction to the folks who created the Festival came in September 2003 in San Francisco, California. With support from the Ford Foundation, HHTF and other arts organizations convened a meeting of artists who were moving forward the concept of “Hip-Hop performance” into the next generation.  If that all sounds a little academic, keep in mind that we’d end just about every session with a freestyle cipher, sometimes in the lobby of the hotel (where the front desk staff asked us to keep it down, but only after they finished listening to the impossibly beautiful voice of Universe’s Mildred Ruiz). At this point, I hadn’t accomplished anything as a Hip-Hop theater artist, but I was accepted into the fold as if I was vet. That spirit has stuck with me ever since.

Let me go back even further, to the first Hip-Hop theater piece I can even remember: Danny Hoch’s Jails, Hospitals, and Hip-Hop.  The year was 1998, I was an NYU undergrad, and I hadn’t yet decided to become a playwright.  I walked out of PS 122 that night with an awareness that theater could be about people who looked like me, sounded like me, and cared about the things that truly mattered to me.  He was a white guy from Brooklyn, I was a Puerto Rican kid from the suburbs, but we were both Hip-Hop—unmistakably Hip-Hop.  Danny put that world of Hip-Hop on stage, and I knew immediately that I wanted to do that too.

So years later, thanks in large part to HHTF, I’m a playwright and educator.  I’m also a big Hip-Hop Theater Festival fan and supporter. This summer, I was fortunate to receive one of the inaugural Future Aesthetic Artist Regrants, standing alongside folks like Baba Israel, Regie Cabico, and other artists whose work and worldviews I deeply respect.  What I love most about that award, and what I love most about the Hip-Hop Theater Festival, is that it all keeps me honest.  It reminds me that we’re a community.  We represent each other.  We’ve got the power to change the world together.  Please consider making a contribution today—even just $5, if that’s all you can do—to help support one of the most important artistic organizations of our generation.

Sincerely,
Kristoffer Diaz
Playwright
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GOT FIVE ON IT?

Each year, we ask supporters of HHTF for Five On It! It’s our annual appeal that allows us to bring Hip-Hop theater to the classroom and the stage.

This year our goal is to raise $30,000 in before the year is out. If everyone on this email list gave just five dollars, we would make our goal.

HHTF relies on the support from individuals. No matter how big or small, your contribution moves the work of HHTF forward.

• $5 says you “Got Five On It!”
• $25 sends a New York City public high school student to a Hip-Hop Theater Festival production free-of-charge.
• $100 covers the stipend for a new Hip-Hop Theater Festival Youth Ambassador internship during the festival.
• $500 underwrites a panel of artists, educators, and public figures addressing the intersection of Hip-Hop art, race, class and gender.
• $1000 allows an emerging artist to present his/her new work at the  Hip-Hop Theater Festival.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE NOW

All contributions are tax-deductible to the full extent of the law. If you prefer to send a check, please make your check payable to: Hip-Hop Theater Festival and mail it to the following address:

HHTF
57 Thames Street #4B
Brooklyn, NY 11237
ATTN: I Got Five On It