Ms. Blakk for President

Ms. Blakk for President is a play with music about Joan Jett Blakk, the drag persona of the activist Terence Alan Smith, who made a run for the presidency in 1992. Tina Landau and Tarell Alvin McCraney wrote it together, and Landau directs. The Vineyard Theatre presents this New York run as a fixed-length engagement, and it follows an earlier production in Chicago.

The play is inspired by Smith's true story but is not bound to it, so it is a work of theater built around real events rather than a record of them.

The setting is the early 1990s, while the AIDS epidemic was still devastating the community. The lead character, Joan Jett Blakk, is a Black drag queen who sets out to run for president. Around her, a brand-new activist group, Queer Nation Chicago, wants queer politics to have a presence at the Democratic National Convention.

The evening mixes forms on purpose. Part of it plays like a campaign rally, part like a nightclub show, and part like a confession, with music running through it. The lead role is billed as both the man and the persona, Terence Alan Smith and Joan Jett Blakk, so the public candidate and the private person share the stage.

McCraney and Landau are the credited writers. McCraney is an Academy Award winner, and Landau is a Tony Award nominee.

Music is part of the evening. Steven Cuevas is the music director, Kristy Norter is the music coordinator, and Darrell Grand Moultrie is the choreographer.

Landau and Zinn have reshaped the Vineyard into an immersive environment. The evening starts before the play proper, with performers working the lobby ahead of curtain, and the room offers floor seating as well as table seating.

As of October 2026, Ato Blankson-Wood plays Terence Alan Smith / Joan Jett Blakk. The company also includes Nic Ashe as JJ, Gideon Glick as Mark, Kelvin Moon Loh as Glennda Orgasm and Adina Verson as Lenny. Sawyer Smith plays Q and also takes on figures such as Ziggy Stardust, Marilyn Monroe and Uncle Sam. Several of the actors play more than one role.

Joan Jett Blakk is a real stage name. Terence Alan Smith ran for mayor of Chicago in 1991, ran for president in 1992 as a candidate of the Queer Nation Party, and ran again in 1996.

The play had its premiere in 2019 at Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago, where McCraney played Joan Jett Blakk. Landau directed that production as well. The Vineyard staging brings the play to New York.