Jazz Under The Stars

He's an Actor, Director, Voice-Over Artist, Mentor, Producer and Lecturer. To tourists, Apollo Theater patrons, celebrity entertainers and friends in Harlem community, Billy Mitchell is Mr Apollo, Spirited and charming, Mr Mitchell knows the Apollo Theater like the back of his hand and is one of the longest tenured employees at the historic venue. In 1991, Mr Mitchell was named the Apollo Theater's Historical Tour Manager and is now the landmark theater's Tour Director and resident historian.

Billy Mitchell was born and raised in Mount Vernon, New York as the fifth of fourteen children. As a young boy, he and his friends would go to Amateur Night at the Apollo. It was on one of his first visits that Billy witnessed the making of a legend first hand, when a nine-year-old Michael Jackson and his brothers won the amateur contest. From that day on, Billy would hop on the train to 125th Street after school and on weekends position himself at the Apollo's backstage entrance, and offer shoe shines and run errands for Apollo performers. In 1984, Billy was hired by the Apollo as an usher. Since then he has wore almost every hat that the theater has to offer including gift shop manager, stagehand, and even Amateur Night Producer, where he auditioned and coordinated the weekly productions. He was also responsible for the Apollo's First Caribbean Music Award Show and produced many of the theater's children's performances.
 

Over the course of his Apollo tenure, Billy Mitchell has interacted with thousands of visitors from around the world, transporting them through pivotal eras in Harlem and Apollo Theater history with the unique presentation that is part vaudeville and part historical lecture. With his countless backstage memoirs and stories about Apollo legends like James Brown, Ella Fitzgerald, Mahalia Jackson, Sammy Davis Jr., Ray Charles, Sam Cooke, Redd Foxx, Mom's Mabley, Denzel Washington, Ossie Davis, Marvin Gaye and The Temptations, Mr Mitchell provides unique behind-the-scenes insight that only a true insider can give.

In 1989, Stickney was cast as “Cora,” a single mother of five children, in the ABC-TV miniseries The Women of Brewster Place, adapted from the Gloria Naylor novel of the same title.  The miniseries depicts the lives of seven urban African American women who live in the Brewster Place Housing Project and featured an ensemble cast that also starred Robin Givens, Lynn Whitfield, Cicely Tyson, and Oprah Winfrey.

In 1990, Stickney brought her comedic timing and Afrocentric flair to network weekly television.  She co-starred in New Attitude, a short-lived mid-season replacement.  Stickney continued to have guest appearances on a variety of television programs, including Law & Order, New York Undercover, and Linc’s.  

Her film credits include New Jack City, Jungle Fever, Malcolm X, What’s Love Got to Do with It, The Inkwell, Die Hard with a Vengeance, How Stella Got Her Groove Back, Talking Dirty After Dark, Gun Hill, My Teacher's Wife, See Dick Run, Trapped Haitian Nights, The Tale of four, Big Ain't Bad, Devon Ka Rakshak, Dolls of Voodoo, Ms. Pat: Y'all Wanna Hear, Dana's Story, Las Mujeres de Brewster, Frederick Douglass an American Life, Tendrils, Pound of Flesh, Clippers, Dana's Story, and Mo' Funny: Black Comedy in America.

New York Attorney Lauren P. Raysor has a passion for helping people. Ms.  Raysor, a 1988 graduate of Fordham School of Law, has worked on behalf  of the people, both in her own practice and as an attorney for the City  of New York and the State Attorney General’s Office. Ms. Raysor  practices in personal injury, civil rights, matrimonial and family  court, and corporate, business, and municipal law.