Baltimore

June ‘22

Juneteenth 2022 Black Anthology Project filmed on the ancestral land of the Piscataway People at a Black improv comedy festival called From Another Mother Festival (F.A.M. Fest). Hosted by the Baltimore Improv Group, a non-profit improv theatre, F.A.M. Fest featured Black comedians and improvisers from across the United States. Each artist performed for local audiences throughout the weekend in the Summer of 2022. There, they shared their stories with our documentary crew in 1-on-1 interviews. This project was made possible by FRFF Full Grant #2022-040. To the right is the trailer produced from our time in Baltimore.

Meet the B.A.P. Team

  • Tashika Campbell

    PRODUCER

    Tashika is a veteran Improviser from North Carolina living in Baltimore, Maryland. Her Improv career started at the Baltimore Improv Group in 2017, where she was a member of the conservatory teams. Tashika is a sought-after facilitator, having worked with Bird City Improv, Improv MKE, Queen City Improv, Highwire Improv, and Improv Utopia(East). She has performed in festivals across the north-east region and globally. She currently serves as the festival coordinator of the "From Another Mother Festival" (F.A.M Fest) and is a co-founder of the award-winning troupe, Cake Walk.

  • Blue Cavell-Allette

    PRODUCER

    Based out of Charm City, Blue Cavell-Allette is a founding member of two critically acclaimed teams Casually Dope and Cakewalk and one of the founders of From Another Mother Festival (F.A.M.) festival, a celebration of black improv. Winner of the 2021 Globehead (Bad Dog Theater, Toronto CA), Blue has been invited to perform all over the world and has taught at many institutions including The Improv College (Montreal), Bird City Improv (Baltimore) and Camp Utopia East. Blue, who has provided corporate training for companies including Youtube and S.C. Johnson is passionate about advocating and adapting teaching techniques to empower people such as herself, who are neurodivergent. Blue is currently a professor of improv at her beloved HBCU Morgan State University and a co-facilitator for the Social Justice Fellowship with Wooly Mammoth Theater and Strathmore out of Washington, D.C.

  • Mary C. Parker

    EXECUTIVE PRODUCER

    Mary C. Parker (she/her) is an international performer and has played with Pittsburgh, London, and Portland improv teams. As a published scholar, Mary has been on the Faculty at Carnegie Mellon University School of Drama and Point Park Conservatory of Performing Arts. In 2022, she was awarded a Frank-Ratchye Fund For Art @ the Frontier Grant to document and research the history of Black improv. In 2023, Mary was awarded the Regional Arts and Culture Council Arts3c grant to continue working on capturing Black Improv stories in Portland, OR. She is based in Seattle, WA on the stolen land of the Coast Salish and Duwamish peoples, and teaches with Kickstand Comedy. More at www.marycparker.com.

Our Baltimore Collaborators

This work is impossible without the support and partnership with Baltimore local businesses.

  • Improv Theatre Partner

    The F.A.M. Fest (From Another Mother Festival) is an improv showcase designed to explicitly center and uplift Black improvisers and comedians by creatively showcasing the expansive Black experience and exposing the art of improv to Black communities through networking, community building, and education.


  • Funder

    This project was supported in part by the Frank-Ratchye Fund For Art @ the Frontier Grant #2022-040 and the Frank-Ratchye STUDIO for Creative Inquiry at Carnegie Mellon University.

    The STUDIO administers the Frank-Ratchye Further Fund (FRFF): an endowment to encourage the creation of innovative artworks by the faculty, students and staff of Carnegie Mellon University. With this fund, the STUDIO seeks to develop a cache of groundbreaking projects created at CMU — works that can be described as “thinking at the edges” of the intersection of disciplines. Since the fund’s inception in 2012, the STUDIO has funded more than 400 projects by CMU faculty, staff, and students.

  • Improv Theatre Partner

    The Baltimore Improv Group (BIG) mission is to create BIG connections within broad communities, teaching people of all ages and backgrounds to improvise their way out of challenging circumstances and embrace the unknown with courage and comedy.