[4] Young thought this was "inconceivable and unacceptable" which motivated her to create the African-American Shakespeare Company to provide opportunities for actors of color in mastering classical theatre.
[6] Sherri Young is on the board of Handful Players, a children's musical theatre, and was previously Commissioner for the San Francisco Arts Commission where she was appointed by Gavin Newsom.
[11] She played Mrs. Candour in The School for Scandal, the AASC production staged at Mills College in 1998[12] and Mistress Quickly in The Merry Wives of Windsor.
[18] Callender has directed numerous non-Shakespearean plays including A Raisin in the Sun in 2012,[19] Cat on a Hot Tin Roof in 2013,[20] and the lauded 2018 production of A Streetcar Named Desire.
[4] In 2016, Callender, Michael Gene Sullivan, and Velina Brown each directed different scenes of George C. Wolfe’s The Colored Museum in order to offer different perspectives.
[27] AASC is a resident organization at the city-owned African American Art and Culture Complex (AAACC) with its office located at 762 Fulton Street Suite 306 in San Francisco, California, 94102.
Since 2002, it has staged its productions at the 200-seat Buriel Clay Theater located on the ground floor of the AAACC building with an annual audience of over 7,500 patrons.
[31] Callender states the reason for the move was due to "the business operations model of the Complex has changed under the new leadership, which has made it increasingly difficult to produce our works.
[7][38] Since 2015, AASC has hosted an annual free community outdoor performance series in the Fillmore District, Western Addition, and Hayes Valley neighborhoods of San Francisco known as The Cultural Corridor.
[40] AASC partnered with the Golden Thread Productions to produce Isfahan Blues, a story inspired by Duke Ellington's tour of Iran in 1963.
[41] In 2015 for its production of Romeo & Juliet, it partnered with Oakland School for the Arts to cast teen actors in title and supporting roles as well as Litquake for their Teenquake programming.