Fire This Time Festival.

Stepping off the subway at 125th Street in Harlem and walking past the iconic Apollo Theatre, we were reminded of the greats from the worlds of music and comedy who have stood on that stage. Artists such as James Brown, Aretha Franklin, Stevie Wonder, Ella Fitzgerald, Richard Pryor, Whoopi Goldberg, and Chris Rock are only a few among the many whose work has shaped its enduring legacy.

The theatre itself is currently undergoing refurbishment, but the Apollo team has temporarily relocated a few doors down to The Victoria Theatre. The Apollo Rooms at The Victoria offer an excellent, purpose-built facility, with both a 99-seat and a 199-seat theatre space. These venues retain a strong sense of intimacy while comfortably supporting ambitious work.

To experience the 17th iteration of the Fire This Time Festival on a stage linked to the Apollo Theatre is to step into a living archive of resistance, artistry, and truth-telling. For nearly a century, the Apollo has been a proving ground where voices rose not by permission, but by necessity, and where artists confronted power, identity, and injustice with courage and craft. Here, the stage does not ask for comfort. It asks for honesty. In that sense, the Fire This Time Featival does not merely honor the Apollo’s legacy, it actively continues it.

The performance consisted of six ten-minute short plays, most featuring two or three members of the five-person ensemble. This structure allowed each performer the opportunity to demonstrate range and versatility as the evening moved through comedic, dramatic, and emotionally charged material with clarity and impact.

The pieces engaged with complex and challenging themes, including the primarily white gentrification of historically Black neighborhoods in Preston Crowder’s Black To Save The Day, the struggle for acceptance within families around issues of sexuality in Donathan Walters’ White Diamond, the dreamlike aftermath of a car accident in Mo Holmes’ Clumsy, the intellectual dissection of a modern relationship (we particularly enjoyed the audiences reactions -"No, don't do it!") as the couple navigated their way towards an intellectual breakup in Tenoia Micazia Brown’s Everything But-, the emotional realities of caring for aging relatives at the end of life in Naomi Lorrain’s DNR and the hilarious, action packed preparations for a “smash and grab” in Delane McDuffie’s Goose.

The quick turnaround, impressively around one minute, between each play kept the audience fully engaged throughout. This format proved both enjoyable and refreshing, offering a welcome break from more traditional setups with longer pauses or intermissions for scene changes.

Thanks to the excellent cast, Nikiya Mathis, Naomi Lorrain, Kareem Lucas, Victor Musoni, and Malik Child, and the creative, engaging work of the playwrights, we thoroughly enjoyed our evening at the Fire This Time Festival and look forward to seeing what the 18th year brings.

More information can be found at https://www.firethistimefestival.com/