By Neil Armstrong
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| Photo credit: Jeremy Mimnagh From left: Tawiah Ben M'Carthy, Thomas Olajide and Stephen Jackman-Torkoff in 'Black Boys' at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre in Toronto. |
After having its world premiere in Toronto two years ago, “Black
Boys” created by the Saga Collectif is back and has toured Vancouver, Calgary
and Montreal since mid-January.
The production will be back in Toronto for a two-week run
from February 28 to March 11 at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre.
“Black Boys” is a raw, intimate, and timely exploration of
queer male Blackness, which is created from the lives of three people seeking a
deeper understanding of themselves, of each other, and of how they encounter
the world.
As they explore their unique identities on stage, they
subvert the ways in which gender, sexuality, and race are performed. Theatrical
and intimate, “Black Boys” weaves
together the ensemble’s own personal stories in search of an integrated self
and a radical imagination.
Tawiah Ben M’Carthy of the cast of three – the others being Stephen Jackman-Torkoff and Thomas Olajide – describes their work as an
art piece, not a play.
In 2017, “Black Boys” was nominated for a Dora Mavor Moore
Award for Outstanding Performance – Ensemble.
“I’ll be the first
person to tell you that ‘Black Boys’ is not a play because it doesn’t fit into
the structure of what a play is supposed to be and it was a bit challenging
during our run here in Toronto to have people who do not get it. And when I say
get it, most of them don’t get it because it’s not a chronological play. They
won’t see something that has a beginning, a middle, and an end,” he said
regarding the reviews of its Toronto premiere in 2016.
Having come up with something requiring people to think a bit
outside the box, it sometimes felt like they were hitting against a brick wall.
“Being creators of the show that was a challenge that we
went through quite a bit,” he said, noting that they wanted people to come in
and be engaged from the beginning to the end.
“It felt like because it wasn’t a traditional piece of
theatre it was something that people didn’t know what to do with. But the
exciting part is that we get to do it again and again and the more we do it the
more people are going ‘oh we get it,’” he said.
People are now saying it’s not a play, it’s an experience
and the engagement continues beyond the play, he said.
Ben M’Carthy says the reception to the
tour has been great and the conversations, spectacular.
He said young people and people of
varying backgrounds could relate to the story that seems to be so specific.
“It’s exciting when you create
something like that, that seems a bit specific, but have everyone watch it and
go, oh I connect with that or relate with that.”
The playwright and actor said they
started workshopping “Black Boys” in 2013 and through to 2016 when they had
three workshops in Toronto. In November that year it premiered at Buddies.
“It was about a three-and-a-half year
process of creating the show – off and on – because we’re all doing different things
in other places.”
There are a few points in the play open
to improvisation, especially with Jackman-Torkoff’s character, where he might
change what he says depending on the room they are in and the day of the week.
Aside from that, everything has remained the same in the remount.
In terms of any revelations for him in
it, Ben M’Carthy says it’s coming to the point of understanding the complexity
of black masculinity and how it manifests itself, and also challenging what is
known to be the stereotypical perception of what black masculinity is supposed
to look like.
“I don’t think it’s something that I
fully understand and that I understood, and I don’t think it’s something that I
even understand now or fully articulate. But what I can say through the experience
of working on such a project and now even traveling with it is I’m coming to
the understanding that it actually does manifest itself in different forms.”
He acknowledges that there is no single
definition or archetype of black masculinity that will “help us move forward,
especially when it comes to the conversation of queer identity.”
The actor noted that queerness and
sexuality are not the same thing; they’re different.
“Having that conversation, just
understanding that masculinity expresses itself in different forms, I believe,
is the way forward. I’m beginning to understand that more and more each time I
work on the show.”
Ben M’Carthy said he is surprised how
much of a deeper understanding he gets of what is going on onstage each time he
does the show.
When it premiered in Toronto, he said the conversation was
already happening with what was happening with Black Lives Matter and there was
an audience hungry for the message.
He felt that although the production was made in Toronto by
Torontonians it wasn’t just for this city; hence the decision to go on tour to
activate conversations in other spaces.
After the Toronto performances, all three will be going off
to do their own thing to acquire new skills and come back in the future to work
on a new project. The process has worked well for them.
Director, Jonathan Seinen, is doing his masters at Columbia
University, Olajide is completing the Canadian Film Centre (CFC) film program,
Jackman-Torkoff is about to act in ‘The Glass Menagerie’ at the Grand
Theatre In London, Ontario, and Ben M’Carthy will be an intern
director for a season at the Shaw Festival.
The creative team includes choreographer, Virgilia Griffith; dramaturge, Mel Hague; and designers Rachel Forbes (set and
costume), Stephen Surlin (sound
and video), and Jareth Li (lighting).
Griffith
is directing a new play, “Ceremony,” at the 39th Rhubarb Festival this month.
[This story was published in the North American Weekly Gleaner, Feb. 15-21, 2018.]
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