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THE PIANO LESSON
Black Troupe Sings the Blues
The Black Theatrical Ensemble’s production of August
Wilson’s The Piano Lesson made me think of Billie Holiday^
later recordings. Lady Day’s world'Weariness, her longing and
faint hope of redemption would make the perfect soundtrack
to the Ensemble textured, sensitive treatment of a work that
deals with the conflict between the troubled past and the faint
spark of a hopeful future. As implied in Holiday’s songs, some
times this hopeful future demands too great a sacrifice from
those who would seek it.
All the action takes place over five days inJ938, in a small
house occupied by Berenice (Nina Mitchell), her daughter
Maretha (Aku Attipoe) and her Unde Doaker (Kenneth
James). The trouble begins when BereniceS brother Boy Willie
(John Marshall) arrives with his friend Lymon from down
South. Boy Willie has a scheme that will allow him to buy
land on the former plantation where his ancestors were slaves
Unfortunately, in order to raise the money, he must sell the
only surviving record of his family’s past — an old piano hts
great-grandfather inscribed with images of his wife and son
Boy Willie sees the piano as useless capital, conspicuously left
alone by his sister, who not only refuses to play it, but also
refuses to tell her daughter what the carvings mean. Berenice
sees instead the housing of the souls of her dead ancestors, a
talisman which her mother polished with her bare hands, rub
bing her blood into the carvings of her family. A struggle tran
spires between the progress-minded Willie and Berenice, who
wishes to preserve the past while neutralizing it. The arrival of
the ghost of Sutter, the plantation owner, forces the conflict
to a crisis. Does one dispel spirits best by selling their home, or
by fulfilling the demands they place on the living?
The actors did an excellent job with roles that demand
subtle distinctions of motive. Marshall captures the eager, na
ive business acumen of Boy Willie He is adept at getting the
audience to react as it should to Willie, shaking their heads in
disbelief at his unswerving trust in a tricky world. Derrick
Barrett provides comic relief and more than a little tension as
the wise-cracking Wining Boy, Berenice’s and Willie's washed
up musician uncle who knows his family's tortured history, and
hides from his despair in the bottle.
Perhaps the standout, if there can be said to be one, is N ina
Mitchell’s Berenice. Mitchell does an outstanding job as a
woman who sees cracks slowly forming in the fragile order of
her world, and is doing all she can to hold it together. The
play is in many ways the story of Berenice finally forced to
come to terms with her past When at last she plays the piano
she dispels Sutter’s ghost, allowing Boy Willie to wrestle with
him and survive. Willie understands the power of Berenice'll
music. Finally relinquishing his claim to the piano, he says,
“You keep playing that piano, Berenice, otherwise, me and
Sutter both liable to come back.”
As promised, the Black Theatrical Ensemble staged a show
that may have been written by and directed towards black
people, but held appeal for everyone. The audience was large
(“Even larger than I expected,” said director Khala Johnson),
diverse and appreciative. Good directing was especially evi
dent in the fine performances elicited from several first-time
actors. This is the kind of thing that happens when a com
pany combines enthusiasm with a fine script. To steal an apt
line from Gary Willis, works like this "are moving not because
they are black art, but because they are black art.” Then again,
maybe Billie Holiday says it better in Lady Smgs the Blues. “If you
find a tune and it's got something to do with you... you just feel
it, and when you sing it, others can feel something too.”
Richmond Eustis
Peace and Vnity Actually Jlaayicn
AH summer I’d been heanng about plans for the World Unity
Festival It was an event feared by law enforcers as an orgy of
drugs and debauchery instigated by ‘low-lifes who didn’t bathe
enough.” and hailed by others as the defining event of a gen
eration Nonetheless, my curiosity was aroused by this rather
enigmatic event set for no definite date or location.
People from all over the world had made a pilgrimage to
the Grand Canyon only to be told that they were not welcome
Finally, a free meadow outside of Flagstaff. Ariz .. was chosen
by a consensus of all those who had spent most of the sum
mer months making this pilgrim
age Even though it wasnt the can
yon the site was spectacular
I really didnt have to suffei
much to get there I was hang
ing out at Macy’s Flagstaff cof
fee house just off Route 66 bask
ing in the glow of the Arizona
summer sun and trading anec
dotes with friends about our just-
completed summer jobs at the
Grand Canyon when a really
beat fellow who had named
himself Golden Eagle ap
proached us, beating one of his
handmade ceramic drums We
were quite enthralled with his
noisy works of art and he was enchanted with
my friend. Mercy He insisted we join him at this most spiritual
celebration
We aH thought that this would be a very Kerouacian ad
venture. so we all jumped in Mercy's mom's convertible and
headed out on a maze of dirt roads that ended at a perfect
meadow surrounded by ponderosa pine trees and the San
Francisco peaks We piled out of the convertible looking — in
my opinion — more like we belonged in an Aerosrmth video
than in this place that so many had chosen as a sanctuary
Even though we appeared less “earthy” with our clean clothes
and tidy tresses, we were embraced and welcomed
For a week astrologicalfy speaking, the camp of 5.000
sang danced, slept, ate and sucked deep at the marrow of
hfe together We celebrated our similarities and appreciated
our differences in cultures, beliefs and dreams We celebrated
by the simplest of means, by the holding of hands, by the
beating of drums together, by taking time to look deep into
someone's eyes and really listen to what that person was say
ing. and by reaching out to hug someone who you just had
met
One of my favorite memories is of the concert by a
Bellarussian folk band The were performing their rendition of
"Those Were the Days. My Friend* in Russian when Mercy
and I grabbed hands and began dancing around Spinning
and laughing, we were joined by others making a
large circle of people
This circle grew bigger
and bigger until m one big
mass of humanity we
were taking up most of the
meadow A little dwarf
who called himself See-
through Feather or Trans
parent Feather (I can't
quite recall) was holding
my hand on one side and
a Native American was
holding my hand on the
other Everywhere I looked,
oeople were smiling and
aughmg in one huge cel
ebration of life
I applaud the World Unity Festival, not only for
creating an open atmosphere for total strangers to unite and
revel in a celebration of the gift that is life, but for doing so
sans commercialization and sans profit There was no admis
sion charge All of the musicians played only for their own
enjoyment and for the enjoyment of others The artists who
were displaying their work were not so much selling it as trad
ing it for something that they needed I krxx# this sounds rather
utopic and impractical, and perhaps it is. outside that small
meadow, but just the fact that no vendors were trying to push
Unity Festival Tshirts and $3 soda pop on everyone is some
thing rare and admirable Long live the spir< of The World Unrty
Festival — for that is something that cant be bought
Amy Wendt
Warm yourself up
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