Dakar 2000
World Premiere
written by Rajiv Joseph
directed by May Adrales
With Abubakr Ali, Mia Barron.
OFF-BROADWAY AT
New York City Center Stage I
2024-2025 Season
In Senegal on the eve of Y2K, an idealistic Peace Corps volunteer survives a mysterious car accident. An imposing State Department operative arrives at his hospital where she immediately takes command of the situation and his safety. Though they couldn’t be more different, they form an unlikely relationship. But when it becomes clear that they both have secrets, the volunteer is roped into a darker side of public service – one he can’t come back from. Unpredictable at every turn, this world-premiere thriller was commissioned by Manhattan Theatre Club.
Written by Rajiv Joseph (Pulitzer Prize finalist for Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo; King James at MTC) and directed by May Adrales (Vietgone and Poor Yella Rednecks at MTC).
Dakar 2000 was commissioned by MTC through the Bank of America New Play Program.
Cast
Abubakr Ali
Boubs
Abubakr Ali starred in ANYTHING’S POSSIBLE (MGM/Orion) dir. Billy Porter and was the titular lead in Netflix/Dark Horse’s series, GRENDEL. Additional selected credits include Kathryn Bigelow’s upcoming Netflix film, LAW & ORDER: ORGANIZED CRIME (NBC), WALKING DEAD: WORLD BEYOND (AMC), POWER BOOK II (Starz), and KATY KEENE (CW). Theatre credits include Toros (2nd Stage), Inherit The Wind (Pasadena Playhouse), We Live in Cairo (A.R.T), Kiss (Yale Rep), Twelfth Night (Yale Rep) and work with The 24 Hour Plays, Primary Stages, NYTW, Atlantic Theatre Company, The Public, and others. Abubakr is a graduate of the Yale School of Drama.
Mia Barron
Dina Stevens
Mia won a Lucille Lortel Award for Outstanding Featured Performer in The Coast Starlight at Lincoln Center, an Obie Award for her performance in Hurricane Diane at New York Theatre Workshop, and an Obie and Drama Desk Award for her work in the ensemble of The Wolves at Playwrights Realm/ Lincoln Center.
She appeared on broadway in Tom Stoppard’s Tony winning production of The Coast of Utopia and in QED (Lincoln Center), as well as in many premieres Off-Broadway, including; The Public Theater, Manhattan Theatre Club, Lincoln Center, Playwrights Horizons, Atlantic Theatre Company and New York Theatre Workshop. She starred in the international tour of Joan Didion’s The White Album, which premiered at BAM’s Next Wave Festival and internationally at the Sydney Festival. She co-created and starred in Off Broadway’s Big Times, directed by Leigh Silverman,
Television work includes Get Shorty, NCIS, and Law and Order: True Crime, Shameless, Newsroom, Elementary, Glee, Blue Bloods, Grey’s Anatomy, Medium, Numb3rs, Bones, Modern Family, as well as the voice of Molotov on Adult Swim’s The Venture Brothers (Cartoon Network).
Mia is a Usual Suspect at New York Theatre Workshop and a recipient of the Joan and Joseph Cullman Award for Extraordinary Creativity at Lincoln Center Theatre. MFA NYU
Abubakr Ali
Boubs
Mia Barron
Dina Stevens
Creative
Rajiv Joseph
Playwright
Rajiv Joseph’s play Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo was a 2010 Pulitzer Prize finalist for Drama. He has twice won the Obie Award for Best New American Play, first in 2016 with Guards at the Taj (also a 2016 Lortel Winner for Best Play) and then in 2018 with Describe the Night. Other plays include King James, Letters of Suresh, Archduke, The North Pool, Gruesome Playground Injuries and Animals Out of Paper. He also wrote the libretto for the opera Shalimar the Clown, based on the novel by Salman Rushdie. He has written for TV and film and has been awarded artistic grants from the Whiting Foundation, United States Artists and the Harold & Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust. He served for three years in the Peace Corps in Senegal.
May Adrales
Director
May Adrales is a director, artistic leader, teacher and mother; she has directed over 30
world premieres. Her work has been seen most recently at Manhattan Theatre Club (Anchuli Felicia King’s Golden Shield, Qui Nguyen’s Vietgone and Poor Yella Rednecks)Second Stage (Rajiv Joseph’s Letters of Suresh), Yale Rep (falcon girls), Guthrie Theater, Huntington Theater, Signature Theater, Lincoln Center, The
Public Theater, WP, New York Theater Workshop, Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Seattle
Rep, Milwaukee Rep and South Coast Rep. She was awarded the prestigious
Ammerman Award at Arena Stage and Theater Communications Group’s Alan
Schneider award for freelance directors. She is a finalist for the SDCF Zelda Finchandler Award, Drama League Directing Fellow, Van Lier Directing Fellow, WP Lab Director, SoHo Rep Writers/Directors Lab and New York
Theater Workshop directing fellow, TCG New Generations Grantee, SDC Denham
Fellowship and PaulGreen Directing Award. She served as an Associate Artistic
Director at Milwaukee Rep; Artistic Associate at The Playwrights Center; Artistic
Associate at The Public Theater; and Director of Artistic Programs and Artistic Director
at The Lark. She serves on the board of Theater Communications Group. May has
directed and taught at Juilliard, Harvard/ART, ACT, Fordham, NYU and Bard College.
She is currently the Director of the Theatre Program and Assistant Professor at
Fordham University. May has served on faculty at the Yale School of Drama and
Brown/Trinity MFA program. MFA, Yale School of Drama. (www.mayadrales.net)
Rajiv Joseph
Playwright
May Adrales
Director