Latrice Young

‘Naptown’ awakens

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By John Lyle Belden

The Naptown African American Theatre Collective made an impressive debut with its opening one-night production of Austin Dean Ashford’s “Black Book,” directed by Dexter Singleton, on May 13.

NAATC is Indianapolis’s first Black Equity theatre company. A 501c3 nonprofit organization, it is dedicated to diverse employment and speaking to the Black experience in all its forms.

We hear from many such voices in “Black Book,” written and performed solo by Ashford, a many-times national champion of Forensics (the art of speech and debate) who expanded to theatre while pursuing his masters degree. (He is presently earning a PhD at Texas Tech.) The central character is based somewhat on himself, a Forensics expert spending a summer as debate coach for a high school in a mostly-Black inner-city neighborhood. He tells his own story, how he elevated himself from a rough childhood and young adulthood mainly through speech and debate. We also get many glimpses of his coach and mentor, based on famed educator Tommie Lindsey. 

We then meet his students, who naturally want to be anywhere but in class, but need summer school credit to graduate. There are four, but there should have been five. Just days earlier, one was shot by a gun-wielding teacher. One of our students caught the incident on his phone and the viral video only managed to get the teacher fired, not prosecuted. Another was a close friend, and the trauma of witnessing the death exacerbated his stuttering. 

Prior to the first class, Ashford’s character asked that the students watch the 2007 Denzel Washington film, “The Great Debaters,” about the life of Melvin B. Tolson, whom the school is named after. In turn, the kids call him out for trying to be some sort of outsider teacher-savior from a popular movie. “This ain’t ‘Dead Poets Society’!”

As he proves to his charges, and us in the audience, this is a more genuine story of how oratory arts can lift up young men and bring about changes individually, and hopefully beyond. He assures them that this isn’t his bid for sainthood, and speech and debate won’t eliminate the thousand little cuts of racism the youths will endure through their lives, but will give them the tools to assert their dignity and heal.

It also opens the spectrum of what it means to be successful: “You can be a champion, and never touch a ball.”

This drama, with plenty of amusing bits and portrayals, does follow the genre storyline to a degree as the coach mostly wins over the kids, and we end with a triumphant exhibition. However, it feels natural, not contrived, and results in the kind of local small victory that such characters can build on. And the way to that “happy” ending is, of course, a bumpy road. One irony that the teacher comes to grasp, and should stab at the hearts of adults watching, is that the one who would have been the best student in this class lies in his grave. We have a long way to go for true victory.

Ashford’s style is captured energy molded in numerous ways, aided by contorted body movements apropos to each character. Being first a master of speech and persuasion infuses his natural acting with commanding power. We are briefed before the performance that the audience should react freely and respond to any question tossed through the thin fourth wall. This we did with almost a feeling of obligation, giving the show the uplifting air of a traditional African-American church service.

During his instruction, Ashford asks, “What’s your big ‘Why’?” What is the purpose that drives you? We get the answer for his various characters, and a major clue as to the whole endeavor of NAATC. This illuminating look at contemporary culture, how it fails our young men, and a possible way to help remedy the situation, is part of a bold premiere season. 

Next, Naptown embraces Motown with “Detroit ‘67,” by Dominique Morriseau, opening Aug. 25. In spring the company swings to August Wilson’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” scheduled to open March 8, 2024. Then, on May 3, NAATC asks us to look into “The Light,” by Loy A. Webb. All performances are at the Phoenix Theatre Cultural Center, 705 N. Illinois St.

The Collective is led by the hard work of LaKesha Lorene, with Ms. Latrice Young and board president Camike Jones, editor of the Indianapolis Recorder, along with Mariah Ivey of the Madame Walker Legacy Center, Flanner House executive director Brandon Cosby, Ron Rice, and AshLee Baskin.

Please visit naatcinc.org to learn more.

IndyFringe: Fly Blackbird Fly/Voices We Can’t Unhear

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This is part of IndyFringe 2022, Aug. 18-Sept. 4 (individual performance times vary) in downtown Indianapolis. Details and tickets at IndyFringe.org.

By Wendy Carson

“Fly Blackbird Fly/Voices We Can’t Unhear” begins by honoring those who are no longer with us. We then see the four actresses entering as children at play.

The group then comes together, giving us monologues about the physical changes of puberty as well as the rude and threatening attitudes of the boys around them to this change. Physical, mental, sexual, and social abuses are discussed, but also acknowledged as sad a part of growing up.

The ladies of the cast – Dedee Austin, Maya Mays, Rav’n Partee, and Latrice P Young – slide in and out of characters ranging in age from 7 to over 45 throughout the course of the show. They enchant us, persuade us, and challenge us not just to hear them but also to fully see them as the complex creatures they truly are.

The show, which Ms. Latrice defines as a “choreopoem,” is a mixture of poetry, scenes, music, and movement portraying the lives of these four females as they grow up into powerful and proud women. Just know that as you are never too old to see a rainbow, you should not leave this spectacle unseen.

Presented by Ms. Latrice, aka Distinctly Unique, with OnyxFest, performances are 9 p.m. Friday and 1:45 p.m. Saturday, Aug. 26-27; and 5:15 p.m. Saturday and 7 p.m. Sunday, Sept. 3-4, at the IndyFringe Theatre, 719 E. St. Clair.

OnyxFest 2021

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This last very busy weekend, aside from various production openings, was opening weekend of the two-week OnyxFest: A Celebration of African American Voices, presented by IndyFringe with performances at the IUPUI Campus Theatre, 420 University Blvd., Indianapolis. We (John and Wendy) were unable to make the shows, but a friend of the site, a member of Indiana Writers Center, gifted us the following review. Opinions are the author’s. Get festival information and tickets at indyfringe.org/onyxfest-2021.

By Celeste Williams

“That Day In February,” Janice Morris Neal’s OnyxFest play, directed by Dena Toler, tugs at all of the strings.

One of five productions in “Indy’s first and only theatre festival dedicated to the stories of Black playwrights,” Neal’s play returns 6 p.m. Friday, Oct. 15, at IUPUI Campus Theatre, 420 University Blvd.

The three siblings, portrayed by Ennis Adams, Jr., Katherine Adamou, and Lakshmi Symone Rae, perform an intricate, emotion-laden word-dance on stage, as they navigate relationships laced with trauma of their mother’s love, but grounded in love.

Neal wrote the play with true events at its core. Even if audiences did not know the specific story behind the production, they would recognize parts of themselves, through the nuanced performances led by Adams and enhanced by Adamou and Rae.

The actors’ interplay brings the background story to life. The presence of the liquor bottle on a table subtly hints at the older brother’s internal fight — to separate himself from his father’s act, even as he fears he has inherited some his ways.

The sisters’ presence brings the brother’s insecurities to light. The more insecure he becomes, the more pours and sips. The middle sister’s anxiety is illustrated expertly by Adamou, whose leg jiggles nervously throughout. Rae, as the younger sister, is the picture of young rebellion.

The fact that it is the younger, rebellious sister, who could not have remembered the events at the heart of the story, is the one to bring the narrative to a head, is a brilliant turn. The father is an invisible presence throughout.

There is a last line (no spoilers) that leaves a viewer satisfied and wanting even more.

In interviews, Neal has said that she wanted to convey “the perspective of adult children who did not grow up with their parents.” The play also touches strongly on issues of domestic violence and the resulting traumas.

“They all grapple with different issues and how to reconcile them,” Neal said. “Even things that happen to us as children can affect us as adults.”

It is a good thing that the ending leaves one imagining what comes next. And, “That Day in February” rightfully leaves appreciative audiences wondering what playwright Neal has in store for us next.

We’ll be eagerly waiting for that day.

—

Thanks again to Williams, and IWC board member Mary Karty, for the assist. The other festival shows are (descriptions provided by OnyxFest):

“1200 Miles From Jerome” by Crystal Rhodes, directed by Deborah Asante, 6 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 14

In the 1940’s, during World War II, a mother, her two daughters, a young school teacher and a 14-year-old Japanese-American fugitive from an internment camp are forced to leave the town of Jerome, Arkansas, and flee over 1,200 miles to New York City. The journey is filled with danger, a daunting experience in which “driving while black” could mean the difference between life and death.

“Fly Blackbird Fly/Voices We Can’t Unhear” written and directed by Latrice Young (Distinctly Unique), 8 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 14, and 6 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 16

A choreopoem recounting traumatic experiences of several Black women. Each woman is at her breaking point and desperately wants to escape the cages they’re in, but this can only happen if they’re willing to relax, relate, and release.

“Ranson Place” by Jameel Amir Martin, directed by Shandrea Funnye, 8 p.m. Friday, Oct. 15

Two unlikely companions holding on to a precious thing, reluctant to leave a special place, must contend with forces that would spur their belated departure.

“This Bitter Cup” written and directed by Charla Booth, 8 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 16

A Black family in the rural south in the 1950’s struggle to find balance in their lives. A son who wants an education to rise above the limitations of the Old South, and a daughter whose dreams are thwarted by being Black and a woman and loved by the wrong man, in a complicated entanglement that leaves us wondering if this family can find peace.

Even when history is changed, have we?

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By John Lyle Belden

From time to time, we all consider what the world would be like if certain historical events didn’t happen – or if others did. These kinds of thought experiments take on a particular point of view in “Apologies to Lorraine Hansberry (You too, August Wilson),” by Rachel Lynett, presented live in the space behind Fonseca Theatre, directed by Jamaal McCray.

“This exists in the mind of every person of color,” says Lynett through a cast member. Welcome to Bronx Bay, an all-Black state created after the just-completed Second Civil War. We who are White, Latinx, etc., are granted a brief stay to see how the story before us plays out.

Alice (Chandra Lynch) is a struggling restauranteur – the problem being that since she is a quarter Asian, she’s attempting a “Korean fusion” eatery. Her husband Lorenzo (Chinyelu Mwaafrika) is supportive, though privately believes tofu has no place in gumbo. Their close friend Jules (Latrice Young) has a new partner, Yael (Aniqua Sha’Cole), recently approved to live in Bronx Bay. We also meet their freind Izaak (Josiah McCruiston).

Everyone on the stage looks like they belong there, but a stunning revelation threatens friendships, relationships and the tranquility of this new utopia. “People died to make these rules,” Alice reminds the others. But does that make what is happening right?

In the second act, we find ourselves in another imagining of Bronx Bay, a place for families like couples Alice and Jules, and Lorenzo and Izaak. So, how does Yael fit in?

The thesis statement of this absurd drama is literally written on the set pieces: “Blackness Iz Not A Monolith.” The “apologies” of the title allude to the tendency to see a playwright’s telling of a Black experience as “the” Black experience. The five persons we see before us are actually speaking Lynett’s words; so, being Black is the perspective of a young queer African-Latinx woman from California who lives in Arkansas?

To the credit of the writer, as well as McCray and the cast, rather than being confusing – even when going totally meta – this darkly comic journey is entertaining and thought-provoking. There’s even an alternative-history game show.

Scenic Designer Bernie Killian provides an interesting stage for an immersive “in the round” experience. Seating is properly spaced around the stage, however, there is no tent or awning so sunscreen and/or hats are recommended, especially during afternoon performances.

One weekend remains of this World Premiere production, May 28-30, at Fonseca Theatre, 2508 W. Michigan, west of downtown Indianapolis. Tickets and information at fonsecatheatre.org.