LaChanze was in the mood to celebrate.
“I am so ready to party,” the actress, wearing a sequined red gown with a bold red lip, said on the red carpet before the second annual Black Theater United gala at the Ziegfeld Ballroom in Midtown Manhattan on Monday night.
LaChanze is the president and a founding member of Black Theater United, a nonprofit that aims to combat racism in the theater community. She was one of more than 600 people — including the singer Alicia Keys, the actress Kristin Chenoweth and the pop-classical musician Josh Groban — who gathered at the grand event space for a live auction, dinner and performance on a night when most Broadway shows were dark.
The gala raised money for the nonprofit founded by an all-star team of Black theater artists, including the Tony Award winners Audra McDonald, Brian Stokes Mitchell, Phylicia Rashad and LaChanze in the summer of 2020 in response to the murder of George Floyd by a white police officer in Minneapolis.
Mr. Mitchell remembered a call at the time with Ms. McDonald, the director Schele Williams and LaChanze. “They just started saying, ‘We’ve got to do something,’” he said.
The organization now offers programs for aspiring young Black theater artists including student internships, a panel and discussion series, a musical theater scholarship and a program that aims to educate artists of color about designing for the theater.
ImageFrom left: Nichelle Lewis, Stephanie Mills and Sydney Terry performing “Home” from “The Wiz.” Ms. Mills was the original Dorothy in the 1975 production of the musical, a retelling of the classic “Wizard of Oz” story.Credit...Nina Westervelt for The New York TimesWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.
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