The Brooklyn Moon Café—the epicenter of a renaissance in spoken-word poetry—was packed wall-to-wall every Friday night during the mid-1990s. The unassuming restaurant and lounge hosted a weekly open mic for poets, some of whom would eventually go on to produce albums, books, and movies: young, gifted, and black poets like muMs (of HBO’s Oz), Saul Williams (of the Rick Rubin-produced Amethyst Rock Star), and jessica Care moore (author of The Words Don’t Fit in My Mouth). Sarah Jones, one of the greatest voices to emerge from that scene, advanced to write and perform solo shows evocative of the early work of Danny Hoch and Anna Deavere Smith.

Since debuting her character sketch-work at the Nuyorican Poets Café in Surface Transit (1998), Jones sharpened her mash-up of comedy, social criticism, and satire in the award-winning one-woman plays Women Can’t Wait (2000) and Waking the American Dream (2002). From 2002 to ’03, Jones even fought the law and won after the FCC fined a radio station for airing her “indecent” poem, “Your Revolution.” (A sample: “your revolution won’t knock me up/ and produce lil’ future MCs/ because that revolution will not/ happen between these thighs.”) Jones sued, causing the commission to rescind its ruling after two years of legal wrangling.

In her Broadway-bound Bridge & Tunnel (last year’s 45 Bleecker Street Theatre version was produced, in part, by Meryl Streep), Jones inhabits fourteen different multicultural personalities, any of whom—Pakistani accountant Mohammed Ali, Mexican laborer Juan José—might be seen strap-hanging on a 7 train headed to her native Jamaica, Queens.

The poet-performer-playwright-spoken-word-artist-actress explained herself during a recent phone call from Manhattan. Chatting amiably on a cellular in the midst of approving her pilot for The Sarah Jones Show—with asides from Steve Coleman, her personal and professional partner—Jones seemed frenzied but in good spirits.

—Miles Marshall Lewis

I. “WE OUGHT TO GIVE PEOPLE A LOT MORE CREDIT FOR THEIR CREATIVITY AS AUDIENCE MEMBERS.”

THE BELIEVER: Tell me about The Sarah Jones Show for Bravo.

SARAH JONES: We taped a pilot, and it was a really important learning experience for me and my partner [Steve Coleman]. He already had experience with Def Poetry Jam on Broadway, and I had my experience dealing with some mainstream television and theater projects. But for the most part, this was our first foray into basic cable and this world of having to worry about focus groups and all that kind of stuff. So we approached it the way we would any other project. We tried to learn as much as we could as we went, and we promised ourselves we wouldn’t compromise our...