Regina Victor
Pharaoh (they/them) is a multidisciplinary artist and intuitive healer originating from Oakland, CA, currently based in Chicago IL. Using the divinatory tools of tarot, storytelling, and poetry, they employ the blk and trans radical imagination to transmute the past, reflect the present, and co-create possible futures. Pharaoh is a certified reiki practitioner in levels I and II.
They are an accomplished cultural critic and essayist placed in the New City Magazine Hall of Fame for their work founding the theatre criticism outlet Rescripted (2017-2024.) The outlet is closed, but the mission, “to reprogram the way we critique each other” is still very present in pharaoh’s practice. Their writing can be seen in Portable Gray, The Chicago Reader, American Theatre Magazine, Playbill, Howlround, and more. An award-winning dramaturg and director, film and theatre credits include The Dulcinee Dialectic (Tao Ruspoli, film), Notes From the Field (Anna Deavere Smith, HBO), Exhibit (Regina Taylor, directed by Phylicia Rashad), and As You Like It (La Jolla Playhouse). They are currently the dramaturg for Gravity: A Newtonian Musical, about the Age of Enlightenment.
Pharaoh has piloted several cultural initiatives, including McCarter Theatre’s Bard at the Gate, UChicago’s Arts & Public Life Critics’ Table, and the Howlround Theatre Commons’ National Advisory Council. Victor served in the inaugural Artistic Caucus cohort from 2021-2022, providing cultural and programming consultation to Woolly Mammoth Theatre, Baltimore Centerstage, St. Louis Rep and Long Wharf Theatre.
Pharaoh stewards many community projects in Bombay Beach, including their gallery "The Poetry House."At the Poetry House Pharaoh offers donation-based tarot readings to the community, curates the public’s painting poetry on the walls, commissions other artists and writers, and holds space for regular poetry salons and workshops. They produce the annual Bombay Beach Drag Show at the Temple to the Scientific Method, hosted by Dadaonysus. This is an essential queer space for this rural community.
Victor’s arts management experience spans over a decade, including Sideshow Theatre (Artistic Director), Court Theatre (Inaugural Associate Producer), The Hypocrites (Associate Artistic Director), Halcyon Theatre (Associate Producer) and Steppenwolf Theatre (Artistic Fellow). They are proud to be a 3Arts Make A Wave, and now 3AP Recipient.
Profile caption: Pharaoh in front of "Dream Demon," a Bombay Beach Installation. Photo by Vanessa Franking
Featured Artworks
Stewarding the Memorial Procession for the Bombay Beach Community, 2026. Photo Credit Laura Austin
Pharaoh leading The Poetry Salon at the Bombay Beach Biennale 2026. Photo Credit Laura Austin.
Featured Speaker at MLK Day in Maui 2025, reading my poem "The Breaks"
Reading Tarot at Loaves and Witches
TCG National Conference - Chair of Local Programming
A panel on the future of criticism, a week after I closed Rescripted, my theatre journalism outlet that ran for seven years. I am being interviewed alongside the next generation of up and coming theatre critics.
Reading Tarot, photo by Bobby D
The Poetry Salon
Annual Poetry Salon hosted in Bombay Beach at The Poetry House
Directing Marie Antoinette and the Magical Negroes at Timeline Theatre
Regina Victor has crowd-funded a project with 3AP
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- $6,425 raised of $6,000 goal
- 0 Days 0:00:00 LEFT
God/Is Sustenance is a multimedia performance and sculptural installation that celebrates and educates its audience on being stewards of the earth. The performance of God Is takes inspiration from African masquerade and devotional worship to honor personal divinity. Sustenance carries …
Read more about God Is/Sustenance: A Multimedia Installation