(JERSEY CITY, NJ) -- On November 20, 2026, Jersey City Theater Center (JCTC) presents an acclaimed 2026 theatre-festival sensation about a young man-of-color's struggle against a repressive legal system told through music, step dancing and rap-infused lyrics. Showtime is 7:30pm.
Writer, composer, performer Dahlak Brathwaite is the creator and star of Try/Step/Trip, based on his youthful bust for possession of hallucinogenic mushrooms and his experiences navigating the legal system. Inspired by this personal history, Try/Step/Trip layers characters, poetic verse, and dialogue over music to create a theatrical piece that blurs the lines between hip-hop and dramatic performance. The production is directed by Roberta Uno with choreography by Toran X. Moore.
“Try/Step/Trip is a high-powered theatrical mixtape that fuses spoken word, hip-hop, step, and ritual to tell the story of ‘Anonymous’, a young Black man navigating a court-mandated drug rehabilitation program and the larger systems shaping his identity,” said Brathwaite. “The piece blends movement, text, and music to explore identity, memory, and connection, inviting audiences into an experience that is both intimate and electrifying,”
Try/Step/Trip had its New York debut at this year’s Under the Radar Festival, where it captivated Olga Levina, Founder & Executive Producer, JCTC. “Try/Step/Trip is a truly emotionally immersive theatre experience. Through Dahlak’s poetry, music, and steps, we feel the profound toll of growing up in extreme need for love, for connection and joy the way it can diminish your dignity, and the strength it takes to rebuild your life and find joy in small moments. It’s the ‘Step’ in Try/Step/Trip that I find so inspirational: those small steps we take each day can carry us through life”.
Step is more than just a metaphor in this contemporary theatre experience, but central to the physical performance. Brathwaite reinvents Step Dancing, a dance-form deeply rooted in multiple cultures throughout the African Diaspora. Step Dancing is percussive-movement where footwork, stomps, hand-claps, body-slaps, chants, and spoken-word create rhythms and beats and the actor’s bodies become both performer and musical instrument.
As the New York Times (Dec. 29, 2025) said in its Brathwaite profile "Try/Step/Trip has a different physical language: step, the percussive dance form developed in historically Black colleges and universities… integrated with the music, becomes an embodied metaphor for the structures and rituals of the court system and group rehabilitation.”
Dahlak is an award-winning dramatic auteur: playwright, composer, performer, director, and filmmaker. A graduate of NYU’s Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program, where he was awarded the Dean’s Full-Tuition Fellowship, his work has been presented at The Smithsonian, The Wallis, Brooklyn Academy of Music, The Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, REDCAT, MCA Chicago, Ars Nova, The Public Theater, The Apollo, SXSW, and on HBO’s Russell Simmons Presents Def Poetry.
Dahlak’s musical, Try/Step/Trip, was nominated for three Drama Desk Awards - Outstanding Book, Outstanding Lyrics, and Outstanding Choreography. Dahlak is also a 2025 Creative Capital Awardee a 2024 Princess Grace Award winner.
Tickets are available for purchase online. Student, senior, season-passes and other discounts are available. White Eagle Hall is located at 337 Newark Avenue in Jersey City, New Jersey.
Built in 1910 and beautifully restored as a state-of-the-art performance venue, White Eagle Hall combines historic character and intimacy with contemporary sound, lighting and production capabilities. In addition to JCTC’s theatre, dance and music programming, White Eagle Hall is available for private events, corporate gatherings, weddings and community celebrations.
Jersey City Theater Center (JCTC) is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) arts organization dedicated to presenting innovative theatre, dance, music, visual arts and arts education that reflect Jersey City’s multicultural identity. For more than two decades, JCTC has connected local communities with artists and ideas from around the world, using the arts to build bridges among diverse communities locally and globally.
JCTC programming is made possible by numerous supporters, including the NJEDA A.R.T. Phase II Program; New Jersey State Council on the Arts, a partner agency of the National Endowment for the Arts; Hudson County Office of Cultural & Heritage Affairs/Tourism Development; Hudson County; the City of Jersey City; and the Jersey City Arts Trust Fund.
Tuesday, November 03, 2026
@ 7:30pm
Mayo Performing Arts Center
Morristown, NJ
There are multiple performances including:
Tuesday, November 03, 2026
@ 7:30pm
NJPAC - Prudential Hall
Newark, NJ
Wednesday, November 04, 2026
@ 7:30pm
State Theatre New Jersey
New Brunswick, NJ
Wednesday, November 04, 2026
@ 7:00pm
McCarter Theatre Center (Matthews Theatre)
Princeton, NJ
Wednesday, November 04, 2026
@ 7:00pm
Mayo Performing Arts Center
Morristown, NJ
