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Looking forward to developing my play GODSPEED at the Colorado New Play Summit next year! Read the full announcement here.

Excited to announce that I’ve been commissioned to create a new play for The Alcove at the Lortel, a new play development program. I’ll be working on THE REVOLUTIONARY’S SON with dramaturg Arminda Thomas. More info here.

Images from THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE at the Contemporary American Theater Festival and the National Black Theater Festival.

I’m still all up in my head after landing back in LA after a whirlwind opening weekend at the Contemporary American Theater Festival. It was surreal to see the play and the characters that have been knocking around my brain for so many years brought to life. Mostly I can’t stop thinking about all the incredible artists who have invested so much of their talent and energy into this project:

CAST

Attius
JEFFERSON A. RUSSELL
Henry
CHRISTOPHER HALLADAY
Effie
CG
Madeleine
LENIQUE VINCENT

PRODUCTION TEAM

Director
CHERYL LYNN BRUCE
Scenic Design
CLAIRE DELISO
Costume Design
JERRY JOHNSON
Lighting Design
JOHN D. ALEXANDER
Sound Design
SHARATH PATEL
Stage Manager
JOHN KEITH HALL
Casting
PAT MCCORKLE, CSA
Iintimacy Coordinator
CARA RAWLINGS
Fight Director
AARON ANDERSON
Dramaturg
THERESA M. DAVIS

Hard to believe that after a two-year pause, THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE will finally make it to stage in 2022! First up at the Contemporary American Theater Festival July 8 – 31, then at the National Black Theater Festival August 1 – 6. I’m truly grateful and thrilled to see the amazing cast (Jefferson A. Russell, Christopher Halladay, CG, Lenique Vincent), visionary director (Cheryl Lynn Bruce) and talented designers and crew bring this play to life — a project I began writing over six years ago.

I wrote a piece for the March/April issue of the Dramatist. The whole issue focuses on the ways theatermakers kept the art alive during the pandemic, and I wrote about what it was like to experience a crowd listening to an audiocast of my play. Excerpt below, full article here.

It was a warm July night in a parking lot in Shepherdstown, West Virginia. Multicolored lights from dozens of LED headphones glittered in the darkness. It looked like a silent rave from the distance, minus a DJ on the 1s and 2s.

The crowd had come out and donned headphones to listen to the audiocast of my play The House of the Negro Insane, produced by the Contemporary American Theater Festival. While the pandemic was still raging and most theatres were still shuttered, CATF persevered, finding innovative ways to bring stories to the people.

To echo August Wilson, an audience is a community of people who gather willingly to bear witness. That sense of community was the biggest piece I missed in most pandemic theatre experiments. Watching Zoom readings and streamed performances on my laptop didn’t come close to delivering the excitement I feel when artists and audiences experience a story, in-the-moment, communally.

Sharing a few shots of the cast (William Oliver Watkins, Christopher Hallady, Candace Grace, Tabatha Gayle) and audio wizards at Dubway Studios in NYC putting in work recording THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE audio play.

THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE audio play drops July 30th!

I briefly appeared alongside other playwright alums from the Bay Area Playwright Festival for a livestream fundraiser yesterday (recorded my bit in front of some of my favorite Jingletown street art). You can still donate to the Playwrights Foundation as they continue to find new ways to support playwrights and our work. Check out the show (featuring Ari Afsar, Lauren Gunderson, Octavio Solis and Reggie D. White) here.

Tomorrow the North Carolina Black Repertory Company, producers of the National Black Theatre Festival, will perform a reading of THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE at the the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art (SECCA) in Winston Salem, NC.

The reading will be performed outside, and the audience limited to 50 to follow social distancing guidelines. Since it sold out, the producers will be livestreaming the reading on Facebook: you can tune in at this link on Sunday, September 27 at noon PST (the video will not be available afterward).

If you missed any of CATF‘s UNMUTED series of “Making of…” and Playwright Interviews when they streamed live in July, you can catch them from Sept 11 to Sept 13 on demand. Tons of great content featuring all the playwrights (including me) and sneak peeks at the incredible plays that will premiere in Shepherdstown in 2021. Register for the encore weekend here.

Taking some time to focus on a couple comic book projects these days. After a very long hiatus, I’ve started updating ROOK again (some art in progress is above – I’m writing and drawing this one). It’s a thriller/drama set in a youth home and inspired by westerns like UNFORGIVEN. And after a very long run (since 2011!), my action/espionage comic PROTEGE (art by Juan Romera) is wrapping up next week. All available online, for free!

Ever wonder what happened in Texas the year of the first Juneteenth (June 19, 1865)? I did, and have been researching and writing a play set during that time. Spoiler alert: shit got ugly.

According to a report by the Texas constitutional convention, white Texans killed almost 400 black people between 1865 and 1868. Reports by the Freedmen’s Bureau (established by Congress to provide food, housing, medical aid, establish schools and offer legal assistance to freed slaves/”Freedmen”) offers a glimpse of the chaos following emancipation. Records relating to “murders and outrages” include:

On the arrival of the first U. S. Troops in Houston (34th Iowa Infty.) a colored man named William, an enlisted cook in “K” Co. who walked uptown in advance of the troops, was murdered in the streets by a white man named Cotton.
Date on or about the middle of June 1865.

James Murphy (white) shot and killed a Freedman named Boston McDaniel on the road from Crockett to Huntsville. Reported cause. The Freedman did not take off his hat to Murphy when he passed him.
Done October 1865. Houston Co.

Freedman Oliver was killed in Montgomery Co. by Maj. Uzzel and Dr. McQueen who got into a quarrel with him because he had gone to Houston to report Maj. Uzzel’s father for non-payment of wages. They beat him with sticks and as he was running away from them fired several shots at him one taking effect.
Done about the 1st of Dec 1865.

On the 26th of July 1865 W. S. Spencer inflicted several severe blows with the iron butt end of a heavy whip on the head of a mulatto woman named Adelaide, cutting to the bone. The said W. S. Spencer then in company with C. C. Millican then tied her hands together pulled her clothes over her hips, bucked her and gave her about two hundred lashes with a heavy leather strap, supposed to be a trace. One of the parties claimed that Adelaide had made an insulting noise when his wife passed. This case was reported by Joel Spencer an old citizen of Brazonia Co. who formerly owned Adelaide and who is the father-in-law of one of the perpetrators of this outrage.

After weeks of protests and outrage across the country, it isn’t news at this point to say that – 155 years later – we have yet to reach the denouement of post-emancipation violence and terror.

THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE will not get its world premiere this July, but work has already begun to make it happen in 2021. The glass-half-full take is that we get a whole extra year to work on the show (as long as the world doesn’t collapse before this dumpster fire of a year is over).

To replace what would have been opening weekend this July, the fine folks at CATF are planning a virtual event to hype next year’s festival. Here’s what I know so far:

• it will be streamed on CATF’s Facebook page July 10-12
• the playwrights will be doing Q+A sessions
• it’ll feature sneak peeks of the 6 plays, including scenes and glimpses of the design process

Here’s the blurb:

CATF serves up an immersive digital experience. CATFUNMUTED gives you an exclusive deep-dive into what it takes to produce six BOLD, NEW PLAYS. In true CATF fashion, we’ve created a repertory schedule where you’ll hear from playwrights, actors, directors, designers, and the other team members that work together to bring these plays to life. Opening Weekend, you’ll see scenes from each play and you’ll talktheater with special pre-show discussions, lively happy hours, and for the first-time ever – individual Q&A sessions with ALL SIX playwrights. We’re not sharing everything, but you’ll wish that it was already July 2021!

Here’s a shot of the genius crew I get to remotely work with to make THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE a reality. Despite the world premiere of the play being pushed back to 2021 (yes, I’m hopeful that society won’t completely collapse before then), CATF is moving ahead with the design phase, and something* will possibly happen this year.

Clockwise from top left: Tamilla Woodard, director; me; Johnathan Alexander, lighting design; Sharath Patel, sound design; Claire DeLiso, set design; Shane Ballard, costume design.

This is one of the most exciting times in the process for me, as the play officially moves out of my head and other folks start to shape the look, sound and feel of the production.

* I’m not sure what kind of something CATF has in the works for this year yet, but as soon as I can spoil whatever they’re scheming I will…

Forced to isolate, the Contemporary American Theatre Festival created a virtual gala on Facebook to announce their new season (including THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE). Big up to the amazing actor David Toney, who bravely performed an excerpt from THOTNI into his phone. These are uncertain days, and despite the distance (all participants were in different locations) it was a welcome shot of hope to watch all these folks who are so committed to bringing theatre to the people.

CATF Artistic Director Ed Herendeen closed with these words: “We’re going to keep you posted. I will not give up hope that we do the festival this season, and if things don’t work out that way… you will see all six of these plays later… whether that means 2020 or 2021.”

More info on the CATF website.
Broadway World: CATF Reschedules 2020 Season.

Via Jacobin:

From the article “The Accumulation of Wealth,” November 28, 1856, published in Frederick Douglass’ Paper.

Wealth has ever been the tool of the tyrant, the readiest means by which liberty is overthrown. A nation starting with free institutions and customs, begins to increase in wealth, and that wealth to accumulate in the hands of a few, and here is the lever by which, eventually and certainly, the liberties gained in a simpler age will be overthrown.

Wealth is averse to agitation; it abhors revolutions; it calls for peace, at whatever sacrifice. A tyranny of an individual or a class may be winding its subtle meshes around the wealthy, depriving them of the right of unrestrained locomotion, the right of speech, the right of private judgment; but if it leaves them the privilege of grasping and accumulating gold, they are content — nay, will aid the tyranny to subject them who value their liberties enough to struggle for them; for the agitation might endanger their gains …

Not only did I see some great shows while across the pond, I met Juliet Wilkes Romero, the very cool playwright of THE WHIP. I read about her play in the Guardian and immediately wanted to take the trip to Stratford-upon-Avon to see it (actually I had no clue how far The Royal Shakespeare Company’s base was from London, but it was more than worth the train ride).

From RSC’s page for the play:

As the 19th Century dawns, politicians of all political persuasions gather in London to abolish the slave trade once and for all.

But will the price of freedom turn out to be a multi-billion pound pay off to the slave owners? Even though such a bailout could drive the country into economic and political ruin?

Spoiler alert: the Brits paid out the equivalent of £20 billion to slave owners. But the question of the play isn’t if they paid it; it’s about how colliding forces allowed the ruling class to win at the expense of black and working-class Brits in the end. Check out the infamous (now deleted) HM Treasury tweet from 2018:

Gotta love the distorted affirmation: “… helped to pay to end the slave trade.” Not: you bailed out/paid off slave owners, you made the rich engaged in a brutal trade richer.

THE WHIP does an incredible job to bring this difficult, infuriating piece of history to life. Politicians love to use the old, tired talking point “how will we pay for it?” when it comes to things like free college, or healthcare for all; THE WHIP reminds us they can find a way to pay for anything — as long as it supports their own selfish interests.

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Just vaulted across the Atlantic for a week in London. From our base in Shoreditch we’ve planned to pack in as much Theatre as possible:

THREE SISTERS, the National

ENDGAME, the Old Vic

THE CANARY AND THE CROW, Arcola Theater

THE WHIP, Royal Shakespeare Company

From our night at the Old Vic:

 

 

 

And from wandering around the hood:

 

 

 

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https://vimeo.com/385721904

A small, amazingly talented crew of artists created a dystopian future in a black box theater for the 2017 production of my play BURNERS (director: Sara Wagner, scenic/prop design: Glenn Michael Baker, lighting design: Martha Carter, costume designer: Michael Mullen, sound design: Joseph “Sloe” Slawinski, helmed by producer Cece Tio).

And as you can see from the video I cut, the actors literally kicked ass every night for weeks.

Check out the BURNERS page for more video, photos and some in-world content.

Cast and creative team of THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE, Bay Area Playwrights Festival, July 2019.

This 1844 notice helped me find the characters in my play-in-progress GODSPEED.

Source: The Texas Slavery Project

“For several days hundreds of whites, Indians and negroes had scoured the country in small bands determined to run down the inhuman wretches…”

– The Tecumseh Republican, Oklahoma, August 30, 1895

Article about the capture of the Rufus Buck gang – led by 18-year old Rufus Buck, son of a black mother and Creek father – by a “curious mob.” The gang’s infamous spree of killing, rape and fuckery across Oklahoma was supposed to, in Buck’s mind, trigger an Indian uprising that would expel the illegal white majority and reclaim the Territory for its native people.

(l-r) Maoma July (Creek), Sam Sampson (Creek), Rufus Buck (Creek/Black, Luckey Davis (Creek/Black), Lewis Davis (Creek)

Many slaves continued to escape from their Texas nightmare throughout the antebellum period by fleeing to Matamoros. Contrary to the patriotic rhetoric that continued to echo across the United States, the land of liberty for America’s slaves lay south of the Rio Grande border, where people of African descent were fully incorporated into everyday life with an ease and smoothness unimaginable in the United States, especially in the Deep South.

– America’s Forgotten First War for Slavery and Genesis of The Alamo, Phillip Thomas Tucker

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Excerpts from my research for THE HOUSE OF THE NEGRO INSANE at the Library of Virginia archives (Richmond, VA), July 2017:

Records from The Central State Hospital (the first institution in the country for “colored persons of unsound mind”).

Commitment papers of Isham Motley, 1874
Q: What is the party’s age and where from?
A: Born in Pittsylvania County and aged 17 years
Q: How long since indications of insanity appeared?
A: About three weeks since
Q: What are they?
A: A general derangement
Q: Is his derangement envinced on one or several subjects, what are they?
A: Several subjects especially religion
Q: Whether any and what restraint has been imposed on him?
A: Been kept tied all the time

Deposition of Matilda Payne, 1876
… she is evidently of unsound mind, will not work, has no visible means of support has no profession and she takes offense whenever anyone offers employment, she is constantly rambling over the neighborhood, which she is not disposed to be [turbulent?] yet she will become offended and a little boisterous at times, when approached by some and asked to work for a living. I have known her for 3 years, she has been insane all this time.

Lucy E. Smith, 1906
Q: Value of self or husband; of parents, if patient is a minor?
A: None
Q: State fully the symptoms of insanity
A: Excitable, noisy and hard to control
Q: What, in the opinion of the examining physicians, are the exciting and predisposing causes of the patients insanity?
A: Physical and mental overwork. (work in laundry during the day and study at night)
Q: What treatment has been given, and with what effect?
A: Tonics and sedatives