Meet Nyla Sampson: A Black Queer Activist At The Intersection of Theatre, Activism and Allyship
Activist, playwright, director, actress, and producer, Nyla Sampson. Photo Credit: Nyla Sampson.
By Jaimee A. Swift
As a Black queer theatre artist, writer, singer, and community organizer, Nyla Sampson (she/her/hers), is using her many talents to advocate for race, gender, food justice, Black visibility in theatre and beyond.
At 24 years old, Nyla Sampson is already catalyzing a formidable legacy in-and-out the theatre and activism worlds that is well beyond her years. Born in Shreveport, Louisiana but truly a New Yorker at heart, the New York-based singer, actress, director, producer, playwright, and community organizer is more than passionate about creating intersectional pathways to equity, liberation, love, and justice for Black queer, transgender, and non-binary communities––it is who she is, what she breathes, what she embodies and what she loves.
Sampson is the founder and creator of the Black Trans Solidarity Fund (BTSF), a reparations group that focuses on and shifts economic sources into the hands of Black transgender people. She is also the financial advisor and co-facilitator of The Okra Project, a grassroots, organizer-led initiative founded by activist and artist Ianne Fields Stewart and funded by the Black Trans Solidarity Fund. The Okra Project’s mission is to mission of combat food insecurity in the Black transgender community by bringing free home cooked, healthy, and culturally specific meals to Black transgender people, by way of Black transgender chefs. Serving as the co-chair of Social Affairs of the New York chapter of Black Youth Project 100 (BYP100), a member-based organization of radical Black youth activists in cities across the the United States, Sampson is also the founding artistic director of The Black Box Project, an artist’s salon dedicated to providing emerging Black playwrights across the African Diaspora a safe, radical, and creative space to share and improve their artistic craft.
Combining art, activism, community organizing, and her unrelenting love for Black people and Black joy, Sampson is not only following in the radical footsteps of the countless Black women activists, artists, and creatives who came before her, she is also inspiring the next generation of Black women and non-binary activists, artists, and creatives as well.
I spoke with Sampson about why she started The Black Box Project; her ancestral admiration, connection, and affinity for Marsha P. Johnson; her thoughts on what it means to truly be a “Black Woman Radical”; and why Black women artists and creatives should not be left out of the history of Black radicalism in the African Diaspora.
Sampson leading a teach-in at the Center for Anti-Violence Education.
Jaimee Swift (JS): How is The Black Box Project creating safe and creative spaces for Black playwrights?
Nyla Sampson (NS): “The Black Box Project was born out of me knowing so many amazing playwrights who were not getting access to projects because of racial and economic barriers. Off Broadway [theaters] are a big thing in New York and we have huge off-Broadway houses that are doing new work. However, if you want your play produced by these large Broadway or off-Broadway companies, you sort of have to be a part of what we call the ‘MFA mafia’–– meaning, you have to do the ‘Juilliard thing’, the ‘Yale [University] thing’, and ‘Columbia [University]’ thing and be in those playwriting programs to even gain access to the types of people to get your work where it needs to be. There were [already] very few Black playwrights I saw being produced but the Black playwrights I saw being produced were the ones fortunate enough to be able to do the ‘institutional thing’. I take nothing away from those people and I want success for them but because certain Black playwrights were able to do the ‘‘institutional thing’, the work they produced, in my opinion, catered too much to the white gaze––even if they are Black playwrights who say they are writing for Black people. I was tired of going to theaters and watching shows that were marketed to us but at the same time, [Black people are] being talked over, around, through and talked about but never talked to. Black audiences deserve more than that and so, I decided to do something about it.”
“I was tired of going to theaters and watching shows that were marketed to us but at the same time, [Black people are] being talked over, around, through and talked about but never talked to. Black audiences deserve more than that and so, I decided to do something about it.”
“Originally, The Black Box Project was only supposed to be a few readings and a rehearsal room just for Black playwrights to get some ears on their work. However, much like The Okra Project, it was supposed to be small and then it got really big. Last October, I was able to produce two large scale readings of two new plays and this past February, I produced two small readings and one full production. To date, I have done full public readings of plays by five playwrights and have gotten them some exposure, which I am really proud of. We also have a very radical politic because The Black Box Project is not only about the Black playwright, it is about how Black people at-large are experiencing theatre. We really try our best to break down barriers that would prevent Black people from coming to see theatre.”
“No Black person is ever turned away because they cannot afford a ticket. We have non-Black people sponsor to cover the costs of the tickets. Unless the play warrants something otherwise, Black people sit in the front, non-Black people of color sit behind them, and white people sit in the back. We also do talk-backs after each performance to see how Black people are responding to the show. Something we do different from any other theatre company is we have a big party after [the show]. This is a space for Black people to let loose because I feel that even when we go to these shows that supposedly are written for us and say they welcome us, at a lot of these large institutional spaces there is still this idea that we are not welcome, we better be grateful to even be there, and we better be on our best behavior––whatever that means. So, we completely break that down––we are ratchet as fuck and we do not care. We really have amazing engagements with Black artists about their art and that is what I want. I want Black people to be able to engage with Black artists in real time with their art. We are moving the barriers between audience and artist.”
“I want Black people to be able to engage with Black artists in real time with their art. We are moving the barriers between audience and artist.”
JS: Since the creation of the Black Trans Solidarity Fund, how have you seen it impact the Black transgender community? Why is allyship so important?
NS: “Around the same time The Black Box Project had our first cycle, there was a rally in Washington Square Park in response to the erasure of transgender language in certain legislation. I was talking to my friend, Ianne, who is a Black trans woman, about the erasure in the legislation and she was upset about it. We both decided to go to the rally and during the rally, a Black trans man spoke about the importance of using advocacy and shifting resources. Everything he said stuck with me. In the days that followed, I began to think about how I can use my privilege as a cisgender person to shift resources to my Black transgender siblings who mean everything to me. This is how the Black Trans Solidarity Fund came to be.”
“The Black Trans Solidarity Fund originally started as a list of CashApps and Venmos of Black transgender people and I would send this list to non-Black people and cis people and say, ‘Yo, donate to people on this list’. Later, I set up a PayPal and directed people to donate to that and then I would redistribute to Black trans folxs who contacted me. In December of last year, Ianne came to me about starting The Okra Project and this how The Black Trans Solidarity Fund became a funder and collaborator with the project. When The Okra Project first launched, I used my connections to shift money to the project and we were able to raise $6,000 in six days.”
JS: Who is a ‘Black Woman Radical’ you admire?
NS: “Someone that I look up to and who gives me daily inspiration is Marsha P. Johnson. She finds me when I need her. I have been inspired by Marsha P. Johnson since I was in high school. I was watching [the documentary] “Happy Birthday, Marsha” and I saw how Marsha would give her last two dollars to someone just so they could have a sandwich. That is something beautiful to me about her spirit and how generous she was. I have always related to her personality-wise, and she was kind of larger than life. After doing my research, I realized she was a Virgo––so we see each other! [Laughs]. A lot of times, people just label Marsha as this ‘weird, eccentric lady’ but nothing about Marsha’s activism was happenstance. She was very intentional about everything she did. I try to do everything I do with just as much intention behind it. I think something that is left out of her narrative is that Marsha was very intentionally political as well. She aligned herself with Communist theory and the Communist party. I think that needs to be talked about more because Marsha really believed in redistributing the wealth to the masses––even if it was her own two dollars. Also, Marsha did not fuck with cops. She called them pigs. That is something I really fuck with and I wish more people talked about that.”
“I always say the women in my family were engaging with and enacting Black feminism and Womanism before such terms existed.”
“My own great-grandmother is also an inspiration to me. Her name was Elizabeth Carr-Robinson. She was such a bad-ass! My great-grandmother used to say, “If you walk into a place like you belong there, then you do and most of the time, people won’t question it.” And she was right. She would walk into places she had no business being in because she just wanted to be there and very few people ever interrogated her about it. She really took care of her community and her family in a way that was compassionate, thorough, and intentional. She has passed but she still guides me as an ancestor.”
Sampson’s great-grandmother, Elizabeth Carr-Robinson.
JS: What does being a “Black Woman Radical” mean to you?
NS: “It means leaving the world a better place than you found it. It means not backing down from your politics. It means studying and doing the work to learn about other Black Women Radicals. I think a lot of people jump into organizing and activism without studying who came before them. I think [being a Black Woman Radical], especially right now, really means being brave. At every point in history, there has been an effort to snuff out Black radicalism, especially as enacted by Black women and LGBTQ+ folxs, and we see it all the time. Many of my comrades have gotten arrested and even killed. But being a Black Woman Radical is acknowledging that reality and doing it anyway––despite what people may have to say and despite whatever danger because it is our ancestral birthright to care for our people.”
“Many of my comrades have gotten arrested and even killed. But being a Black Woman Radical is acknowledging that reality and doing it anyway––despite what people may have to say and despite whatever danger because it is our ancestral birthright to care for our people.”
“I try to bring Black radicalism with me wherever I am––whether it is direct action or art––because I am an artist and so many Black Women Radicals were artists as well. I think that gets left out of a lot of their legacies is the work of Black women artists and how they used art to say what they needed to say. I think of Nina Simone and Billie Holiday. Most people would not consider them community organizers or radical change-makers, but I do, especially given the songs they wrote and how unapologetic they were on issues they spoke about. A lot of people today do not understand that “Mississippi Goddamn” and “Strange Fruit” almost got them killed, simply for speaking their truth through their art and daring to put in on the radio. I think that is really important. So, [being a Black Woman Radical] is using whatever your talents are to make change.”
To support Nyla Sampson, you can pay Nyla via her CashApp.
For more information about The Black Box Project, visit here and here.
For more information about The Okra Project, visit here.
To support the Black Trans Solidarity Fund and The Okra Project, please donate here.