By Neil Armstrong
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| Kanika Ambrose |
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| Jordan Laffrenier |
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| Chicago playwright, Reginald Edmund, managing producer of the Black Lives, Black Words international project that will have its Canadian premiere at the 38th Rhubarb Festival at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre in Toronto. |
Some local
black playwrights will be showcasing their ten-minute plays responding to the
theme, “Do Black Lives Matter today?”
Created by
Reginald Edmund, a Chicago playwright, the Black Lives, Black Words international
project has explored the Black diaspora experience in Chicago, Minneapolis, and
in London, UK.
It will now
have its Canadian premiere in Toronto on February 24 and 25 at Buddies in Bad
Times Theatre.
The project
will be presented at the 38th Rhubarb Festival in partnership with
Obsidian Theatre Company and the National Arts Centre.
Edmund, who is the managing producer of
the project, says after the events of Trayvon Martin and the long list of
others he realized that there wasn’t an opportunity for artists of colour to
speak their truth regarding this important issue.
Martin was the 17-year-old African
American male from Miami Gardens, Florida killed by George Zimmerman, a white
man, in Sanford, Florida on February 26, 2012. His killing led to many protests
and the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement.
“I felt this strong need to speak. I
felt this really strong need to have my voice heard and speak about this horrible
issue that was taking place, and also tell the story of the community,” says Edmund.
He wondered to himself how many other
people out there also had this shared desire to speak their truth.
“And so I just begin that hunt for
other artists to join and be a part of this discussion,” he says, noting that
the project was started in Chicago in 2015.
The resident playwright at Chicago
Dramatists says part of the reason why he decided to take the project beyond
the United States is that it wasn’t solely in his country that the issues of
Black Lives Matter were taking place.
“I wanted to have a global look at that
discussion so that we can address the political, the economic and the cultural
similarities and differences between all the Black diaspora. While we’re
discussing these issues that are taking place within the world we’re also
offering, hopefully, solutions within that discussion as well.”
He notes that in order to find
solutions it is important to examine the shared experience while being aware
that Black is not a monolithic race.
“Amiri Baraka once said that theatre
must be revolutionary and I really took to that message and said how can I
really apply this to our art form.”
The
local writers taking part in the
project are Leelee Davis, Kanika Ambrose, Jordan Laffrenier, Tawiah Ben Eben
M’Carthy, Motion, Luke Reece and Meghan Swaby.
Performers include Akousa Amor-Adem, Shomari Downer, Virgillia Griffith, Cassandra Mentor and Nabo Nabea with the directors being Audrey Dwyer and Jamie
Robinson.
Ambrose says she has been working on a piece about a
black woman’s response to seeing so many black men’s lives being taken for no
reason.
“As someone who is a black woman and I have two
brothers, I have my partner, and when I see the senselessness of the lives of
black men being taken, I immediately think of the black men that I love. So I’m
responding to that gut reaction of seeing dead black men on the ground in the
media, in the news, in videos, and seeing the men in my life and the men I love
in those images and in those videos.”
In her creation, the black woman tries to protect
her man by shielding him, whether it be her lover, her husband, her son, her
father or her brother.
Ambrose doesn’t think her piece will offer any
solution but that it will be a visceral response – “physical theatre.”
“It’ll definitely be a two-hander and definitely in
this work and with all my work, physical is just as important as the text.”
Ambrose thinks “Black Lives, Black Words” shouldn’t
just stay in Toronto because there’s a lot to say in other Canadian cities.
“I think it’s important that we don’t stay silent
and we express ourselves in all of the various ways that we can. And the way
that I express myself most strongly is through my art, through my writing, and
my creation, and so I think that that’s how I can lend my solidarity in this
movement most strongly,” says Ambrose about the Black Lives Matter movement.
Laffrenier says when he read the prompt, “Do Black Lives Mater Today?” he laughed.
“I thought this is going to be the
easiest piece I have ever had to write: an actor walks
on stage, repeats the question, and
says, “No, obviously not.” It’s very simple; most
people who define themselves as white
don’t care about black people.”
He continued: “I think there are very
few “white” people that wake up in the morning and think: I need to do
something about racist policing policies, there are now more blacks in prison
than there were blacks in slavery, I need to do something about the education
gap, I need to encourage my MP to fight for reparations for the racist housing
policies that have occured even within the last forty years that have driven
blacks into ghettos.”
Laffrenier says he is constantly
surprised talking to his black peers that they don’t know about Jim Crow.
He says it has been hard to respond to
the prompt in a way that is absolutely contemporary.
“Firstly, our experience has changed
pretty vapidly since the recent election but a lot
of people are already talking about
that and there is no need for conversation that is
already happening nearly everywhere.
And secondly, there is a political correctness that people have signed on to
now, that at the very least, has made language less racist.
As it currently stands, his piece
exists as a bunch of sketches, scenes, and poems and it’s hard for him to say
if it will offer solutions.
“But I will say, many solutions have
been offered before and people haven’t signed on to them. Maybe my job isn’t to
offer solutions, but to get people to sign on to the solutions that already
exist.”
He thinks “Black Lives, Black Words” has
the ability to capture the black experience on a global scale and to connect
black lives across borders.
“There is a loneliness that is
associated with being black. This project will act as a reminder that we are
not alone,” says Laffrenier.
Edmund thinks part of the reason “Black
Lives, Black Words” has been successful is because practitioners from various
levels of experience unite to respond to what is taking place.
He notes that there is a solid need and
desire for these voices to be on stage which explains why the project has sold
out in every city it has been to within days.
This is his first venture into the
Canadian scene both as an artist and as a producer, and also for the project.
Within every city, Edmund says he does
his best to build a bridge between Black Lives, Black Words and the Black Lives
Matter organizations within the community.
“I feel like since this project was
inspired by these brave activists that we have a duty to them as well to help
in whatever way that we can and to be fully engaged with that community there.”
He hopes that this work serves as
beacon for other artists to speak out and to stand up and have their voice
heard in this time.
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