Agri-Culturalism, Farm Arts, and a Bag Lady?
Dear Friend,It’s amazing what happens when you hold on for dear life long enough for the universe to?jump-up!?and surprise you again—and again. Well, I’m a playwright again, and I’m?luv, luv, luvving?it!?
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In just two more weeks, my play,?St Stephen: A Passion Play,?a performance piece for actors, dancers, and musicians, rooted in Afri-Caribbean ritual and experimental theater―will take on new life.???
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You know me.?Both the play and the story behind it have a history . . .
The main character is LADY/MARINETTE―an ancestral spirit who appears to us as a bag woman. Her home is Crossroads, a train terminal, maintained by time-keeper/station-master and ceremonial priest, KEEPER/HOUNGAN. People come and go at all hours (historic dates) to and from the same destinations (destinies) that keep the all-too-human condition on track.?
By the way, the character of LADY was inspired by a real woman―a “homeless” “bag lady” who took up residence, spreading blankets, laying out her home, and speaking to her “guests”—commuters and railroad personnel—in New York’s Grand Central Station.
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In LADY's shopping bags are bits and pieces of history she has preserved to tell us who we are, where we’ve come from and where we’re headed.?At “home,” reading a crumpled newspaper, she learns of the South African medical/law-student-turned anti-apartheid freedom fighter, Stephen Bantu Biko.?
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In the Christian tradition, St. Stephen was the Church’s first martyr; stoned to death for his beliefs.?Stephen Biko was jailed for his anti-apartheid, anti-colonization, anti-oppression activism and beaten to near-death while in police custody.?Dumped by police, naked and shackled, outside a South African hospital in Pretoria on September 11, 1977, he died of a massive brain hemorrhage the next day.?
Unable to save STEVE, LADY knows she must preserve his story; make known this St. Stephen's martyrdom in the cause of universal human rights.
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Written in 1981,?St Stephen?was given a staged reading by the Negro Ensemble Company (NEC) in 1982. Adolph Caesar (best known for his role as Sgt. Waters in Charles Fuller’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play,?A Soldier’s Play; a role he reprised on screen in?A Soldier’s Story)?directed the reading.?In 1983, Amiri & Amina Baraka published an excerpt in their book,?Confirmation: An Anthology of African American Women.?In 1984, the Dramatist Guild selected the play for their tribute to women playwrights.??Duane Jones (best known for his leading role in the landmark horror film?Night of the Living Dead?and the Cannes Prize-winner,?Ganja & Hess),staged and directed scenes from the play.?
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Robert Nemiroff―whose devotion to his wife, Lorraine Hansberry’s work, brought her play,?A Raisin in the Sun, to Broadway―approached me about staging?St. Stephen.
Ellen “La MaMa” “I don’t read plays, I read playwrights” Stewart also committed.?The Cathedral of St. John the Divine offered to house a production.?Then Life happened and made other plans for the play and for me.??St Stephen?never received a full production.
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But, the story doesn't end there . . .
Two months ago, my dear friend Tannis Kowalchuk―Founder and Creative Director of Farm Arts Collective, an “Agri-Cultural Center for Farming, Performance, Food & Ecology”―and I met for breakfast and cooked up a plan.?I’d return to my roots―in theater, that is—with her company at the farm she and her husband, Greg Swartz, own in Damascus, Pennsylvania:?Willow Wisp Organic Farm.
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With characteristic insight, Ellen Stewart defined her vision of theater (and life): “We do not work to communicate with the audience; theater must communicate with the gods!”
Come?Juneteenth, Monday, June 19 at 7:00 pm ET,?here’s hoping . . .??
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Join us for the reading, conversation, and farm-fresh food for thought.
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For tickets, click?here.
To hear our open rehearsal livestreamed from the studios of Radio Catskill on?Saturday, June 17, at 12 noon ET,?click the LISTEN LIVE button?here.??
And, for a?New York Times?feature on Farm Arts Collective?at Willow Wisp, click?here.
#BLACK BOOKS MATTERHave you subscribed to my pro-book, pro-African American history and culture, pro-sanity campaign:?50 BOOKS THAT CHANGED THE STORY OF AFRICAN AMERICA??It's FREE to JanusAdams.com subscribers!
Last week:?Narrative of Sojourner Truth.??Why was this specific book selected??HINT: It not only “changed” the story of African America—it changed my understanding of my own life’s stream.?Perhaps, yours too . . .
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If you haven’t yet done so, sign up now for your?free subscription?to?50 BOOKS THAT CHANGED THE STORY OF AFRICAN AMERICA.??
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DeNeen L Brown, REPORTER
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We first met Washington Post Reporter, DeNeen L. Brown, here on?The Janus Adams Show,?when filmmaker Dawn Porter returned to the show with her documentary?RISE AGAIN: Tulsa and The Red Summer.?Infused with DeNeen L. Brown’s “ground penetrating” radar lens as reporter, the people of Tulsa—victims of the Tulsa Massacre, May 31-June 1, 1921—were resurrected before our eyes.?Our understanding of what was done to them was brought into sharper focus and context?Brown—reporter, crusader—has since restored the victims of Florida’s 1923 Rosewood Massacre to remembrance.??Lest we forget.?And there are her articles on theater, Zora Neale Hurston, following the Volta River, and why she will, someday, leave the United States.?Even more fascinating is the woman, herself, and why she writes.
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Visit the show page?here.
Download the podcast on Apple?here.
AND ONE MORE THING . . .
For June brides (and grooms), those soon to be; and just because . . .?
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Gbemi Okunlola is the Nigerian-British founder of the London-based fashion house, Alonuko.?Her fashion brand creates “iconic pieces that introduce every woman in their best self.”?Her specialty collection of exquisite “illusion” (sheer tulle) wedding dresses grace every skin tone—just as the gods and goddesses would have it.??And, yes, Alonuko does trunk shows in the United States.
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Who doesn’t need a moment of sheer beauty??Here’s wishing you love and baubles of #BlackJoy.?
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Harambee!
Janus
*?Harambee is a Ki-Swahili term popularized by the Kenyan Independence Movement meaning "let's all pull together!"
Emmy Award-winning journalist, author, historian, keynote speaker,?
Dr. Janus Adams?is publisher of BackPaxKids.com and host of public radio’s
“The Janus Adams Show” and podcast.
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