who he is...
“The Media Scientist” Bio
At one point in his life, jeff obafemi carr could easily
have become a statistic. He was living the stereotype for
young black males in high school, living a dream that was,
unbeknownst to him at the time, a self-destructive nightmare.
By day, he was a gifted young choir section leader, band
drum major, actor, and devoted church member who even taught
bible class. But at night, he would morph into the person
he fantasized of being: a part-time thief, hustler, and mischief
maker who hid his straight F’s in school and penchant
for the street life from all who knew his other side. Eventually,
jeff’s two worlds collided: A vandalism prank got him
expelled two weeks before he would have—barely—graduated
from high school.
He landed in a juvenile detention cell, and that’s
when jeff obafemi carr decided he’d had enough. He couldn’t
risk being a statistic anymore.
Although it took him another seven months, he graduated from
high school with the determination to make his way over the
obstacles he faced. He studied hard enough to get into Tennessee
State University, where he made his mark as a campus leader,
an activist, and a scholar. As president of the Student Government
Association his senior year, he lead hundreds of students
in the now historic 1990 sit-in that effectively loosed the
purse strings of Tennessee government to the tune of more
than $140 million in campus improvements for the HBCU. As
a direct result of the sit-in – and jeff’s leadership
– a new campus center, administration building, performing
arts center, and many other physical structures were built
over the next 14 years. More importantly, the experience gave
jeff the skills that would see him through additional challenges
that were yet to come.
After graduating cum laude from TSU with a degree in speech
communication and theatre (and a minor in radio and TV production),
carr began an artistic career that placed him on a unique
path to success. But as a multi-talented individual in a world
that encouraged singular focus, knowing where to start was
a bit of a quandary. It wasn’t as if his gifts were
a passing fancy. He could act. He could sing. He could write
all genres of fiction and non-fiction. And he could communicate.
So jeff chose the path less traveled: He focused, singularly,
on doing all of these things well. Thus was born the moniker,
“The Media Scientist,” a term he created to describe
a process through which he would utilize the scientific method
of Observation and Experimentation to create art that could
touch people through various forms of media.
The rest, so far, is his-story. For 11 years, jeff published
The Third Eye, a monthly Nashville newspaper with a circulation
of 10,000. At various points, jeff interviewed, wrote, edited,
and even distributed the paper. Because of its popularity,
he was offered a chance to host a struggling community radio
talk show on historic WVOL, the station that gave Oprah her
start. He actually learned to engineer shows on the same board
she used, expanding a weekly talk show, Let’s Talk,
into a nightly event that was one of the most popular programs
in the city.
Returning to the stage, where he hadn’t appeared since
college, jeff immediately blazed a trail. He earned his union
card and established himself as a force to be reckoned with,
an actor known for his quick thinking and ease of movement
and character. By the mid-‘90s, he had built enviable
careers in several areas. But something was missing, some
hole that needed to be filled. jeff believed that he needed
to be attached to something higher in his life, something
special. With a child on the way, and a career in flux, he
attempted marriage – or, you might say, marriage attempted
him.
Six years, one child, and two failed marriages later, jeff
learned that the special “something” he sought
had nothing to do with the people in his life, and everything
to do with the life that was inside of him. It was a life
he almost relinquished to depression and self-doubt. Some
of it came from being with in relationships with people who
didn’t believe in him, who even belittled his life’s
work to his face; some of it came from being so poor that
he almost lost his home, lived without heat and a telephone,
and had to gather loose coins from between seat cushions of
a borrowed car just to get by. Wherever it came from, whatever
the obstacles, he came to the realization that he possessed
something that some people search their whole lives for and
never find; something he believed, at first, was a curse,
but came to know as a true blessing.
jeff obafemi carr was in possession of a unique calling.
It was a fateful night in 2001 when carr realized that the
obstacles in his life had strengthened him for higher and
greater things. He had cried his tear ducts dry when he looked
up from the floor of his study and saw the faces of his family
and mementos of his life. He realized that his personal struggles
took a back seat to the vision that was placed within him
from a higher voice. And from that night, he never looked
back. He began to spell his name in all lowercase letters
as a reminder of the need to be humble and in submission to
the Higher Will, and his accomplishments to date are a living
testimony to his acceptance of his true calling in the arts.
Currently, jeff is co-starring in the upcoming feature film,
The
Second Chance, with recording artist Michael
W. Smith. He is the founding artistic director of Amun
Ra Theatre, a not-for-profit, professional theatre company
in Nashville dedicated to exposing the world to “The
Hidden Light” of African-American culture. A former
commentator on the nationally syndicated The Tavis Smiley
Show, he is now a regular roundtable member on the groundbreaking
National Public Radio Program News and Notes with Ed
Gordon. A popular commentator, he still finds time to
co-host Freestyle, a media talk show in Nashville that airs
weekly, keeping his streak of radio presence alive for 15
continuous years.
jeff is a veteran of more than 20 professional stage productions,
having appeared at regional theatres nationwide, including
The Alabama Shakespeare Festival, Portland Center Stage Company,
The Tennessee Repertory Theatre, Bristol Riverside Theatre,
The 1996 Olympic Arts Festival, The American Negro Playwright
Theatre, and Nashville Children’s Theatre. He has appeared
in works from Shakespeare to August Wilson and all points
in the middle, learning to love and appreciate the master
storytellers.
A personal student and friend of the late playwright John
Henry Redwood, jeff has also written seven plays; three have
been professionally produced. He wrote and directed a children’s
choreo-poem, Before
The People Came, in a collaboration between Amun Ra Theatre
and Nashville Children’s Theatre in 2004. The play sold
out 38 solid performances and was featured at the prestigious
Provincetown Festival of New Works for Young People in New
York, NY in the summer of 2004.
jeff has authored one book, Black
Stuff: Poetry and Essays on the Afrikan-American Experience,
and his essays have appeared in Essence, The Black World Today,
and The Tennessee Tribune. His essay, African-Americans, Where
Do We Go From Here, is published in the millennium archive
book, Nashville:
An American Self-Portrait, and his essay, The Game of
My Life, appears as a model of a well-written composition
in the textbook, Wordsmith:
A Guide To College Writing. Not bad for a kid who once
made F’s in English.
Driven by a desire to touch the limits of his calling’s
potential, jeff continues to strive to create and tell the
story. When not confined to the safety of his over-crowded
study, laboring away at the latest creative endeavor, he can
be found on the road, reaching people through speaking, coaching,
acting, teaching, or performing in his one-man, seven-character
play, How Blak Kin Eye Bee? . The
piece was once performed to rave reviews at the historic Ryman
Auditorium in Nashville, and has since been taken to colleges
and universities nationwide. jeff can also be found at any
number of Nashville’s finest jazz clubs, where he sings
silky, hypnotic vocals along with a trio of some of the top
regional artists in the country.
A licensed minister, jeff spends his personal time with his
daughter, friends, young people, or with total strangers,
looking for opportunities to share the one thing he has learned
through experience with hard knocks and overcoming obstacles.
“It’s all about the spirit we have within us,”
this true Renaissance man says. “And that spirit comes
from a source that created the universe. So we can all rest
assured in the fact that we absolutely cannot fail, when we
embrace and live the thing that we were born to do.”
For more info, go to www.jeffobafemicarr.com.
|
