Eisa Davis

EISA DAVIS is a writer and performer whose plays include ANGELA'S MIXTAPE, PAPER ARMOR, SIX MINUTES, and BULRUSHER. She is a recipient of the Helen Merrill Award for Emerging Playwrights, and of fellowships from the Van Lier and Mellon Foundations. Her essays on hip hop theatre have appeared in American Theatre and The Source. Eisa’s work as an actor includes roles in Adrienne Kennedy’s June and Jean in Concert, and in the films Brass Tacks and Robot Stories. Upcoming: Confess and All Fall Down. Eisa has performed her original songs at Joe's Pub, BAMCafé, Tonic, CB’s Gallery and Lounge, Makor, the Zipper, and on Showtime's Soul Food. A graduate of Harvard and the Actors Studio Drama School, Eisa is a native of Berkeley, CA and a resident playwright at New Dramatists.

Eisa Davis’s work explores the personal and local languages people create to establish individual character, and how these ways of speaking document community history and honor experiences that aren’t necessarily valued in the mainstream. A subsequent theme in her work is how these languages, stories, and folklore shift out of the “underground” and into the center of popular culture, how this migration also changes cultural meaning. Eisa Davis has also worked closely with the Hip Hop Theater Festival since its inception.

As a singer, Eisa has performed with Greg Tate’s Burnt Sugar, with Daniel T. Denver in the duo Tinctures, and as a solo artist. Her brand of minimalist soul includes Eisa on piano and vocals, guitarist Marvin Sewell, bassist Miriam Sullivan, violinist Charles Burnham, percussionist Daniel Sadownick, and drummer Chris Vatalaro.
www.newdramatists.org, www.hiphoptheaterfest.org, www.amazon.com (keyword: tinctures)

HIP HOP ANANSI, a musical collaboration with Fred Beam and Patrick Crowley. Updating the Anansi folktales from the African diaspora into the hip hop vernacular, an MC, DJ, and deaf actor-dancers will perform the piece using rhyme, music, movement and sign language. Opens February 2006 at Imagination Stage. www.imaginationstage.org

Eisa’s play BULRUSHER will premiere at Urban Stages March 2006.

Eisa and nicholasleichterdance are collaborating on a new piece with live music. www.nldnyc.org

Eisa is also developing a film based on her play ANGELA’S MIXTAPE and the autobiography of Angela Y. Davis.