Ask Alexus Rhone about her roots, and she’ll tell you without hesitation: “From South Park Village concrete grew this ‘Yellow Rose of Texas.’”
That grounding– equal parts Houston grit and Black Southern grace– runs through everything she creates.
An alumna of Willowridge High School and the University of Texas at Austin, Rhone is also a seminary-trained, modern-day Claudine who proudly claims membership in what she calls the notorious “first-born girlchild gang.” As she puts it, “We don’t play. We get things done. We throw hands.”
That mix of intellect, irreverence, and unapologetic Black womanhood has made Rhone a respected and revered artist across multiple disciplines, including author, spoken-word poet, playwright, podcaster, director, and more.
Rhone built much of her artistic reputation in North Carolina and on national stages. But what began as a pit-stop visit back home has turned into a relocation and relaunch in the Bayou City. And she’s arriving with clarity about who she is and what she offers.
“I am an artistic theologian and a master storyteller,” Rhone says. “I tell stories about the sweetness of Black girls and the compassion of Black women. I tell these stories on all of the platforms, stage, screen, web, radio, and podcasts. Give me a mic and a stage. I got it. And I got you.”
Artistic theologian
Rhone’s self-description is precise and intentional.
“My art form is storytelling,” she explains. “Regarding my ‘theologian’ designation, I attended seminary and have a Master of Arts in Theology. My intentions were never to be at a pulpit in the four walls of a church, but to really explore the presence or perceived absence of God in our lived reality.”
She explores those questions through varied story forms—some didactic (providing moral instruction), most not. But it’s all Rhone and all real.
“I’m reverently irreverent (respectfully disrespectful). So, I’m not for all of the audiences. But the ones that I am for, I am absolutely loved and loved well,” shared Rhone.
That reverent irreverence has roots in her upbringing.
“One of the things that is real for Black women and particularly Black women in under-resourced spaces is the presence of God as God is particularized in Jesus Christ in the Black church,” Rhone says. “But also, just the wiles of the one that we would call the devil… Fortunately, I was a part of a single-parent household where the church was very, very much a part of my experience. And also a lot of what I see in the public sphere, they got wrong.”
For Rhone, faith and struggle coexist. “The ‘reverent’ part is my, ‘Yes, I’m going to venerate and love God.’ The ‘irreverent’ part is that sometimes… you’ve got to get your hands dirty because not everything is going to play nice.”
“I’m reverently irreverent (respectfully disrespectful). So, I’m not for all of the audiences. But the ones that I am for, I am absolutely loved and loved well.”
Alexus Rhone
That refusal to be boxed in is central to Rhone’s creative freedom. And it’s in line with the spirit of Nola Darling, the main character in Spike Lee’s classic movie She’s Gotta Have It—one of two movies Rhone says best capture her essence. The other being the 1974 film Claudine starring the late Diahann Carroll.
“It just becomes a way of me practicing perfect self-expression,” she says. “Do the thing that feels good that gets you the results that you’re after,” channeling both heroines.
From author to multifaceted artist
Rhone has never pretended to neutrality. She is deeply rooted in her beliefs and lets them guide her work.
“What I wanted was to be successful with significance,” she says. “So, Alexus the artist began as Lex the writer.”
Her early mission was specific and urgent: reaching Black girls who had decided they weren’t readers.
“If you, as a preteen or as a teen Black girl, decide that you hate reading… you’ve basically cut yourself off from all of these resources.”
Rhone wrote what she calls gateway fiction, using familiar settings like South Park Village, Missouri City (Willowridge), and UT, so girls could see themselves on the page. The goal was simple: Read her books, then reach for others.
“If what they don’t like on the shelf is not capturing them, I had to put some stuff on the shelf,” shared Rhone.
After that mission took root, Rhone expanded. In 2014, she adapted her first book, Primitive Pleasures, into a poetry and dance stage production.
“Since then, I think I have been living the absolute dream,” she says, producing original stage works, digital storytelling, and now screen projects. “I’m scaling up, doing all of the beautiful things artistically.”
Praise for Rhone
Audiences and critics alike are feeling Rhone. Charlotte-based Star Robinson Russell calls Rhone, “So boss in creating experiences that bring the curious and the courageous together.” Theatre critic Serayah Silver describes Rhone’s production Ancient of Ways as “a practice in personal and generational healing,” noting how Rhone invites audiences to “re-member our own experiences of Black Girlhood.”
Houstonian Demethra Orion recalls being transported by Rhone’s staged readings that she experienced in Houston and Washington, D.C.
“I closed my eyes and was literally watching a mind movie,” said Orion.
Love for Black girls and women
At Rhone’s foundation is devotion.
“I am at my core, ideologically driven by my love for God’s creation and unapologetically about my love for Black girls and Black women,” Rhone says.
She wants them to see accurate, nuanced reflections of themselves—to find mirrors, not caricatures. Her work insists that Black women’s sweetness “is not syrupy” and their compassion “is not foolish.”
“There are so many different ways that people should be in around-the-clock praise for Black women and who we are and the way that we love, and the way that we remember others, and how we show up,” added Rhone.
There’s no doubt Rhone’s got to have it. And heaven help anyone who disrespects Black girls and women and gets in her way.
For more on Rhone’s past, present, and future works, visit www.alexusrhone.com.
