Lie Still On The Day of Pain And The Day Of Joy Will Greet You with Shakina Nayfack

Explicit content warning

06/13/21 • 39 min

Sunday Pancakes with Celia Keenan-Bolger

Most recently, SHAKINA NAYFACK made television history starring in NBC’s Connecting... as the first transgender person to have a starring role in a network comedy. She can also be seen in Amazon’s GLAAD Award Winning Transparent Musicale Finale, which she helped write and produce, and Hulu’s Difficult People, for which she was a writing consultant. Her play Chonburi International Hotel and Butterfly Club premiered on Audible in 2020 in collaboration with Williamstown Theatre Festival and was recognized with a 2021 Drama League Award for Best Audio Theatre Production. She is the Founding Artistic Director of Musical Theatre Factory, where she helped to develop hundreds of new musicals including Michael R. Jackson’s Pulitzer Prize winning musical, A Strange Loop and her own autobiographical glam rock odyssey, Manifest Pussy.

Weekly Round-Up:

Watch the documentary Disclosure on Netflix.
Listen to the On the Rookie podcast episode “The Roadmap For Liberation, feat. Janet Mock” and then read Janet’s book, Redefining Realness.
Read My Gender Workbook by Kate Bornstein.
Visit Shakina’s website to learn more about her work and download her award-winning Audible play, Chonburi International Hotel and Butterfly Club.
Support the Juneteenth Jubilee, organized by Intersectional Voices Collective.

Weekly Round-Up:

Watch the documentary Disclosure on Netflix.
Listen to the On the Rookie podcast episode “The Roadmap For Liberation, feat. Janet Mock” and then read Janet’s book, Redefining Realness.
Read My Gender Workbook by Kate Bornstein.
Visit Shakina’s website to learn more about her work and download her award-winning Audible play, Chonburi International Hotel and Butterfly Club.
Support the Juneteenth Jubilee, organized by Intersectional Voices Collective.

Previous Episode

Javier Muñoz and Standing in Awe of Humanity

JAVIER MUÑOZ is an actor and activist whose impressive body of work spans theater, film and television. Javier is best known for co-creating the role of, and starring as, "Alexander Hamilton” in the cultural-phenomenon musical Hamilton on Broadway for two years, after Lin-Manuel Miranda departed the show (and was his alternate prior to that). He got his break starring as “Usnavi” in In the Heights on Broadway, also created by Miranda. Javier will soon star in the dark comedy indie feature, Monuments. On the TV side, he’s appeared on Shadowhunters, Blindspot, Quantico, Full Frontal with Samantha Bee and will soon be heard voicing the character of “Ohm” on Disney’s upcoming animated series Eureka. Recent theater credits include The New Englanders at MTC and the starring role in the North American premiere of Stephen Lloyd Helper’s A Sign of the Times. Javier is also an outspoken activist for LGBTQ+ rights and a Global Ambassador for (RED), which fights to end HIV/AIDS. Muñoz was honored with the prestigious OUT100 "Breakout of the Year" award in 2016, as well as the Howard Ashman Award by the Gay Men's Health Crisis (GMHC). Javier now serves on the Board of GMHC as well.

Weekly Round-Up:

Read The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai
Watch the short documentary, Short Fuse about Danny Sotomayor, a Chicago activist
Listen to Slate’s What’s Next podcast episode “Larry Kramer Wouldn’t Be Quiet”
Read about Javier Muñoz Day
Support and learn more about the organizations Javi mentions: GMHC, Broadway Green Alliance, and BCEFA.

Next Episode

Ashley Park on Building Resilience and Practicing Gratitude

ASHLEY PARK is a Tony Award nominated actress, currently starring as “Mindy” in the hit television series Emily in Paris. For her performance, she became the first Asian American Actress to receive a Critics’ Choice Nomination for “Best Supporting Actress in a Comedy Series.” She will next appear in Bleecker Street’s upcoming feature Mr Malcom’s List. On stage, Park is perhaps best known for originating the role of “Gretchen Wieners” in the Broadway production of Tina Fey’s Mean Girls. In addition to her Tony nomination, she received Drama League, Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle and Chita Rivera Award nominations for her performance in Mean Girls. That same season, Park garnered critical acclaim for starring as “Mwe” in KPOP, for which she won the esteemed Lucille Lortel Award for Lead Actress in a Musical and was nominated for her second Drama League and Drama Desk Awards of the season. Other Broadway credits include: Grand Horizons; Mamma Mia!; The King and I; and the recent revival of Sunday in the Park with George. On television, Park reunited with Tina Fey for Peacock’s new hit series GIRLS5EVA and was previously seen in the critically-acclaimed Netflix limited series Tales of the City. Other television credits include Apple TV+’s Helpsters and PopTV/Lionsgate Television’s Nightcap. Park is the proud recipient of Actor Equity Association’s 2018 Clarence Derwent Award, and in 2019 was honored with the inaugural Marin Mazzie Award for Empowerment by the Cancer Support Community. Her outreach as a social activist and a cancer survivor has stayed important to her through her dedicated work and support of service organizations such as the Make-A-Wish Foundation and Broadway Cares Equity Fights AIDS. Park graduated from the University of Michigan with a BFA in Musical Theater.

Weekly Round-Up:

Listen to the Still Processing podcast episode with Cathy Park Hong.
Read the Harvard Business Review article, “To Dismantle Anti-Asian Racism, We Must Understand Its Roots” by Lily Zheng.
Listen to Krista Tippett’s On Being podcast episode, “A Life Worthy of Our Breath” with Ocean Vuong.
Watch highlights of the late Marin Mazzie in The King and I, which she starred in with Ashley.