David Roussève / REALITY:
Becoming Daddy AF
2025
“David Roussève’s latest solo Becoming Daddy AF is one hundred minutes of grace, boldness, and virtuosic performance.”
— Arts Meme
“Nonlinear and fragmented, yet entirely whole, Roussève’s first evening-length solo work in over two decades imparts meaning in an exquisitely synesthetic journey.“
— Words on Dance
Celebrated dance-theater artist David Roussève marks the 40th anniversary of his company REALITY with his most intimate work yet. Part autobiography and part retrospective, Becoming Daddy AF is the unforgettable self-portrait of a life lived in motion. With grit and wild humor, Roussève weaves generational tales to trace lineages of ancestry, artistry and cunning in his first-hand telling of the life of a queer, African American man born in the 1950s and the histories his body holds. Through a vibrant collage of evocative archival imagery, propulsive sound, fluid gestural movement and powerfully embodied storytelling, Becoming Daddy AF charts 600 years of family genealogy with four decades of unforgettable dancemaking from the man The Washington Post described as “one of modern dance’s great stage personalities.”
As Roussève journeys across decades and continents—from ancestral roots in Portugal in the 1400s to downtown dance venues in the 1980s, from Houston’s third Ward to the halls of Princeton, from heart-stopping first glances to heart-rending loss—his exuberant and expressive dancing conveys the knowledge of his sixty-plus years while offering an unflinching vulnerability. Becoming Daddy AF invokes the joy, humor, messiness and beauty of lives forged in survival to conjure a heartfelt tribute to the transformational power of love, and to those who bravely, relentlessly seek it.
CREATIVE TEAM
Written, Directed, Created and Performed by David Roussève
Dramaturgy by Charlotte Brathwaite
Video design by Meena Murugesan
Sound design by d. Sabela grimes
Lighting design by Christopher Kuhl
Costume design by Leah Piehl
Early-stage dramaturgy by Julie Tolentino
Technical direction by Christopher Kuhl
Sound and video engineering by Padra Crisafulli
Company management by Leanne Iacovetta Poirier
Additional production support from Gurmukhi Bevli and Harper Justus
Management and producorial support by George Lugg
UPCOMING PRESENTATIONS
Fall 2026: Dance Place, Washington DC
PAST PRESENTATIONS
May 23–25, 2024: In-process showing, Danspace Project, New York
Jan 11, 2025: “Coming Attractions” with Edgar Miramontes, Under the Radar, New York
May 3, 2025: In-process performance, MASS MoCA and Jacob’s Pillow, North Adams
Sep 27–28, 2025: World Premiere at Kelly Strayhorn Theater, Pittsburgh
Oct 17–18, 2025: Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA, Los Angeles
COMMISSIONING & SUPPORT
Becoming Daddy AF is a National Performance Network Creation & Development Fund Project co-commissioned by Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA, Kelly Strayhorn Theater, National Center for Choreography Akron, and MASS MoCA with Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, more information at www.npnweb.org.
Becoming Daddy AF was created with support from Danspace Project, UCLA’s Chancellor’s Research Fund and The Chancellor’s Arts Initiative.Daddy AF is made possible with generous support from the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project with lead funding from the Doris Duke Foundation and the Mellon Foundation, and a MAP Fund creation grant.
Becoming Daddy AF is made possible with generous support from the New England Foundation for the Arts' National Dance Project with lead funding from the Doris Duke Foundation and the Mellon Foundation, and a MAP Fund creation grant.