Marla
Lou
FEATURES & INTERVIEWS
Producing
BROADWAY WORLD
Theatre Producers of Color Announces 2023 Cohorts
Theatre Producers of Color, the newly formed organization committed to supporting the next generation of BIPOC producers by providing access to education, training, and mentorship, announced their 2023 cohort for the third-annual education program.
How Marla Louissaint Is Making the Revolution Irresistible
The Jimmy Award-winning artivist is using her voice to save Black lives through her nonprofit, Claim Our Space Now.
ARTICLE & VIDEO
Born in Haiti & raised in NYC, Marla uses multimedia platforms for telling stories of the Black experience in America while tackling issues of systemic inequality. Combining her education, art and activism, Marla not only creates content that informs and engages others on how to help dismantle longstanding prejudices in our society, but she also provides a safe space for her community to speak their truths through their own forms of expression.
PODCAST
From the Beautiful the Carole King Musical on Tour family, Marla Lou joins Black Hair in the Big Leagues! Marla is a true trailblazer, unapologetically going forth as her most authentic self. During this pandemic she founded Claim Our Space and is a VOICE and activist during a time that it’s needed the most. She is a model, director, student at Fordham University, and a stylist with a bomb eye for fashion!
Follow Marla on IG @marlalou_ and @claimourspacenow and www.claimourspacenow.org
VIDEO​
How would we be impacted as a community if we focused more on those who are making Black History right now?
INTERVIEW
"Hi Marla, where are your from? We’d love to hear about how your background has played a role in who you are today?
My upbringing as a Haitian Immigrant and Jehovah’s witness are the backbone of my whole story..."
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HONORABLE MENTION
We’re honored to present the 2021 Creative Class, presented by The Creative Collective NYC. The Creative Class is a celebration of culture-shifters across a variety of disciplines, from tech, social justice, fashion and beyond, who inspire us to be our most unapologetic selves. These creatives are shaping their own future and building their vision from the ground up. We stand on the shoulders of the giants who have come before us.
PODCAST
Marla Louissaint, whose performance credentials include “Beautiful: The Carole King Musical” and “Kurt Vonnegut’s God Bless You, Mr, Rosewater” sits down with host and producer Saadia, along with Marla's longtime friend & Immigrantly associate producer, Kylee, to reflect on the road to becoming an ex-Jehovah’s Witness and the Founder/President of an abolitionist nonprofit called "Claim Our Space Now."
REVIEW
As a drunken and possibly lunatic millionaire, Santino Fontanagives a performance of ineffable sweetness in “Kurt Vonnegut’s God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater,” an odd duck of a musical by Howard Ashman and Alan Menken that’s being presented as the final entry in City Center Encores! Off-Center summer season.
PODCAST
On this episode, I interview Marla Louissaint (she/her), a Haitian-born performer, published model, activist, abolitionist, visionary, and life-long student who is also the founder of the non-profit Claim Our Space Now. Marla didn't anticipate being an activist, or "artivist" as she likes to say. She says how it is something the ancestors chose for her because she had many things she wanted to say and people needed to hear them.
Marla
Lou
Born in Haiti and raised in Washington Heights NYC, Marla is a first-generation Computer Science graduate (Fordham University ‘20), internationally published model (Vogue Italia, Oprah Magazine, SavagexFenty), award-winning theater performer (2015 Jimmy Award Winner), TV/Film actor (Netflix’s Seven Seconds, Showtime’s Flatbush Misdemeanors), and the Founder & CEO of abolitionist 501c3 organization Claim Our Space Now.
In navigating through her own healing and liberation from the oppressive spiritual tradition she grew up in, Marla has claimed her purpose to make the revolution irresistible boldly through her art, advocacy work, and sharing her own testimony. Her creative storytelling and active community building embrace the collective beauty, brilliance, and power of the Black diaspora. She seeks to joyfully invite the global Black community to fully realize and claim their self-determination to shape the future Black history. And she’s just getting started!