We are a team of independent young theater artists working together to raise funds to produce a fully staged iteration of Tariq's Interlude - a one-man-show written and performed by Antonyio Artis, and developed with director Tessa Bagby.

The show will run August 20th - August 24th, 2025 at HERE Arts Center, Dorothy B. Williams Theater, as a part of HERE Arts' Sublet Series. Our funds will be used to pay for the space, to pay our designers and crew, and to cover our rehearsal costs.

The Plot

Beep…beep….beeeeeeeep…….An NYC train singer named Tariq wakes up in Purgatory with no memory of his death. Despite a rocky past and with big plans for the future - including an impending proposal to his pregnant girlfriend, Marissa - Tariq convinces God to let him live one more day to prove his life deserves more living. Except God is a bad communicator, the music of the city is loud, and there’s something going on with Marissa that everyone except Tariq seems to know about…

With only his body and a chair, Antonyio channels the sounds and motion of New York City, transforming between six characters while transporting us through Purgatory, the park, the subway, a McDonalds in Queens. This show is hilarious, soulful, and serves as both a love letter to NYC and to the born-and-bred underground artists who populate it.

Tariq’s Interlude is a physical, joyous, visceral solo show that explores personal responsibility, faith, and what it means to choose how we express love.

The Team

Antonyio Artis (he/him) is a multi-faceted NYC artist who graduated with his BFA in Acting from Brooklyn College. Since graduating, Artis has performed in the record-breaking national tour of New Jack City, ’24 NYTF Winning musical production of Underground, and has self-produced three short film adaptations of the plays Thoughts of a Colored Man (Keenan Scott II), Boy’s Life (Howard Korder), and Jitney (August Wilson), to name a few. At 16, he wrote an original rap song for EduHam, a program started by the Broadway musical Hamilton, and performed the song on stage at the Richard Rodgers Theater for the original cast and an audience of 1300 people. He is currently a member of the Actors Center’s first-ever cohort of mentees, which began in October ‘24. His solo show, Tariq’s Interlude, was in development as The Village’s ‘24 Artist-In-Residence. He recently embodied the roles of Thomas and Billy Strayhorn in the new plays Odds and Storme, respectively, having played the latter in October ‘23.

Tessa Bagby (she/they) is a Bay Area-born, Brooklyn-based director, dramaturg, and nurturer of original live performance. Proscenium-averse in practice, Tessa collaborates with candor, rigor, and care to develop and present new work. They’re interested in questions about the dissonant relationships between the spiritual and the corporal, desire, personal responsibility, environment, transformation, embodied queerness, and unbalanced power.

Recent directing credits include MAiD in America (Dramatists Guild Foundation, NYU), Spew’s Little Baby (The Tank), The Angry Brigade (Drew University), God and Abraham Play Ping Pong (Minnesota Fringe Festival). As an assistant/associate director, Tessa has worked with Will Frears, Jolie Tong, Kim Weild, Jack Serio on his hyper-intimate production of Uncle Vanya (3 Drama Desk Nominations, including Outstanding Revival of a Play), and Emma Went, whose world-premiere production of Else Went’s Initiative she will be associate directing at The Public this fall. Tessa was a 2024 Performance Artists-in-Residence with The Village, developing Antonyio Artis’ solo show Tariq’s Interlude, and is a director in the 24 Hour Plays: Nationals 2025 cohort. Wearing many different hats, they have supported processes on and off-Broadway with The Public, The Apothetae, HVSF, Juniper Street Productions, The Tank, Mercury Store, Ensemble Studio Theatre, The Gym at Judson, Brooklyn College, and, best of all, in basements/roofs/living rooms across the city.

Devon Kish (He/They) is a Brooklyn-based independent creative producer and drag artist (Dirt!). They work primarily in new plays in development by early-career artists, especially queer and trans artists. He passionate about helping to tell stories that up until very recently would have been buried, often for the very first time.

Recent work includes WATCHDOG at Ars Nova's ANTfest, Missionary Woman at Theater MITU, and Sex Change by Sondheim at Parkside Lounge. They are also the sole Associate Producer on Trans Am, coming to Joe's Pub this September.