If This World Were Mine...
(for the record--u spelling buffs leave me alone, cuz i ain't finna be hyper-checkin' my stuff, 'specially late at night!)
i just got off the road from a whirlwind trip to Tuscaloosa, Alabama, where my daughter just finished performing in her first professional theatrical production, "The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe," where she mesmerized me as a member of the white witch's army. i was overjoyed, depressed, and motivated--all in various stages.
OVERJOYED
You have to understand something: i'm a lot of creative things, one of them being a professional actor. i am a card-carrying, dues paying member of Actor's Equity Association, who got in during the time when people were still--for the most part--earning points in pro shows to get in. now you kinda just "pay the fee" and you're in if you get a good gig. i was a "tweener," so i was working up points, THEN had a good opportunity on a show several years ago that put me over the hump. Why do i relate this story? Because, i've worked my a** off to develop my craft over the years.
When i was a little feller, i never saw any people who looked like me onstage anywhere. When we went to the children's theatre or the performing arts centers, there weren't any Black faces; and when there were a few, they seemed to always have a friggin' rag on their head or be carrying a serving tray. Hindsight is 20/20, so i can say now, that was some psychologically damaging mess. At around 8 years old, i saw an all-black production of Aesop's Fables at Tennessee State University called "Aesop's Falables." It starred my cousin, Gloria Charles, as Jacqueline-In-The-Box. How do i remember that when i can barely remember what i ate this morning for brunch? Because i saw something i'd never seen before:
A stage full of gifted, magical people, who looked just like me.
It was on from there. My first real acting teacher was probably Robert Smith, a local attorney who started the In-God's-Name Players at Kayne Avenue Missionary Baptist Church in South Nashville where i was raised. My brother, sister and i all got started up in that joint. Robert was a founding member of the legendary Princely Players and he brought that work aesthetic to us as children. The bug had bitten me, and i was stung good. i was a little tyke of a fella in those church plays. i so looked forward to moving up from being a member of the chanting mob that lynched Jesus to playing the role of Pontius Pilate. "Art Thou King of The Jews?!!" i uttered with a high-pitched, Richard-ish country twang that destroyed my elder brother's nerves when it escaped from between my anxious little lips. Ahh...the good old days, i reminisced, as i joyously watched my daughter bounce her little minority butt across the stage with high energy. She got her start doing plays in her summer program at Fisk University a couple of years ago and she's quite good i must say, much better than a few of the kids in some of the bigger roles...more later on that.
For a while, i was happy to see her doing her thing.
DEPRESSED
Church gave me a lot of early acting esteem--Thank De Lawd--because i would need it.
High School came along (we didn't have drama in what we called Junior High but what is now "middle school," and i had excelled well in the small parts i had at Percy Priest Elementary), and i found myself one of the only flies in the buttermilk. Unlike many upwardly mobile knee-grows of today, i do not say that with pride. :-) As the darker brother, i quickly learned a lesson: if you are really good, talented, articulate, versatile, and learned in the ways of demonstratable and repeatable drama, you can still play 13th fiddle to a gallery of white guys with none of the previous skills, but possessing the one thing that could guarantee a lead: white skin. So, i toughed out a four year career playing any number of roles including the frightened orderly in "Dracula," the pissed-off black kid with one mini-monologue in "Up The Down Staircase," the jovial Stew-pot in "South Pacific," and some other forgettable theatrically-related roles that, to this day, remain non-descript. i had a really cool theatre teacher who let us lay on the floor in class and promised every year to do "Othello" in the coming season so that i could play the lead. that was over 20 years ago, and it still hasn't been done at that school. that must be a record for a mule's carrot, huh?
Needless to say, i rescued enough esteem to make it to college and the loving arms of Tennessee State, where color didn't matter--we were all black and got to experience what most of my white colleagues and friends take for granted in America: what it's like to be in an environment where you are judged on talent--WITHOUT race being a factor. That scared me at first, because i realized that now, i had to be good to make the play. If i was shining a shoe, it was because i couldn't deliver otherwise. Luckily, though, i had a powerful four years of drama that ranged from Shakespeare to Philip Hayes Dean and all points in the middle. What a life! Then, i graduated and got into the professional world and guess what?
Back to High School it was.
THAT was jacked up, especially living in Nashville. But i paid dues. I sang the ooos and ahhhs behind some singers whose voices could barely project five feet ahead; i acted with Juliard-trained well-to-dos who had the instincts of the socks i just took off. i resigned myself to "paying professional dues" until i got sick of it and started traveling. i went all over the country to seek out roles and it was all the better for the career. i decided not to do work unless it was important to me or moved me or did something for someone to lift them up.
i was poor a long time. i probably still am, but since i eat everyday i don't think about it.
There was a time, though, when the heat wasn't on, i had no phone, i ate rice almost every day, and i had to scrape for change between the seats of my car just for a little gas money. It's been a tough row to hoe, and that's just with acting alone. i've got a million other stories about my singing, my writing, my commentaries, radio and film work, newspaper publishing, and other areas of Media Science. These experiences have helped shape me, who i am and who i ever shall be. i've been criticized, beat down by people in relationships who didn't believe in me, ostracized by people i thought were friends who really weren't, attacked verbally, put down, put on, almost put out, cut off, cut down---you name it. All because i had this dream thing going; this artistic dream thing going. i wouldn't trade my experiences for the world, but i wouldn't put them on anybody.
Anybody...Somebody...Oh no...
That's when the depression hit.
I looked at my little bit and remembered last summer. By then, she'd been in a couple of plays already, had helped me in my one-man show, and had just seen me in "The Piano Lesson" with Carl Gordon of Roc fame. In the car, she informed me that she still wanted to be a Pediatrician (yeah!!!), but that perhaps she would be an actress instead.
Lawd. Lawd. Lawd. Help me.
She's got the skills--memory, voice, and the presence thing you can't teach. She can make it, but i was depressed for a while because i don't want her to have the face the same esteem-damaging world i faced, and i began to glimpse the black child's pattern on the stage before me. We need some art that allows our children the same luxury that kids from the mainstream have: a place to shine....
MOTIVATED
All of a sudden, i saw it: an all-black version of LWW. or better yet, a whole new series of plays and books that have faces like mine at the very center. How cool is that? Then, little black children won't have to deal with questioning their talents and doubting themselves. i run a theatre company that is establishing itself well in the community. We have a lot on the horizon. i was reminded that, while i'm developing art for the grown folks, i must NEVER forget the children.
And why not a production FULL of children, at least once a year, with some training in between to make them sharp and focused? if not me then who, if not now...you know the rest.
RENEWED
And now, after having driven over four hours, seeing a play, taking an emotional/theatrica/psychological roller-coaster ride, then driving back home to the 'ville and exorcising some insomnia with this first real blog entry, i'm ready to lay in my bed with Tananarive Due's latest book, "Joplin's Ghost." It feels good to express like this, and i wonder how naked i'll dare to be? only time will tell.
For now, i sleep, perchance to dr--heck, i'll be happy if i can just sleep. bump tha dreamin'...
obafemi
