World Premiere of Dr. Mary Weems' CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL, Monday, 8/27 (Nashville)

Please click image to enlarge.

Please join us for a first look at Dr. Weems' play

CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL

(awarded Best New Play 2012

by The African American Playwrights Exchange)

at 7:00 pm on Monday,

August 27th at the

Z. Alexander Looby Theatre,

when two of Nashville's finest young actors

- Amelia Young (Junior, Franklin Road Academy)

and

Colin Carswell (Junior, Father Ryan Academy)

bring CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL

to life under the direction of

Dr. Dara Talibah.

Dr. Mary Weems' CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL awarded Best New Play 2012. See it performed Monday August 27th (Nashville)

Two of history's most powerful and moving stories converge in Dr. Mary Weems' stirring new play CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL when Anne Frank and Emmett Till meet in the afterlife just moments after Emmett's funeral.

Please join us for a first look at Dr. Weems' play - awarded Best New Play 2012 by The African American Playwrights Exchange (AAPEX) - at 7:00 pm on Monday, August 27th at the Z. Alexander Looby Theatre, when two of Nashville's finest young actors - Amelia Young (junior, Franklin Road Academy) and Colin Carswell (junior, Father Ryan Academy) bring CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL to life under the direction of Dr. Dara Talibah.

The event is free.

Come to Nashville and Go to the Theatre.

Jaz Dorsey

Dramaturg/Founder

THE METRO NASHVILLE PARKS THEATRE DEPARTMENT'S NEW PLAY READING SERIES

Dr. Frank Dobson

Dr. Mary Weems

On Monday, August 27 we have our next reading event at

The Z. Alexander Looby Theatre

2301 Rosa Parks Boulevard

Nashville Tennessee.

This FREE event begins at 7:00 p.m

Showcasing two one acts - YOUNG MESSIAHS FLY

by Dr. Frank Dobson, Executive Director of The Bishop Joseph Johnson Black Cultural Center at Vanderbilt University

and CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL

by Dr. Mary Weems of Cleveland, Ohio.

YOUNG MESSIAHS FLY deals with the repercussions of the murder of a young African American basket ball star by a policeman. CONVERSATION AFTER A FUNERAL is about a meeting between Emmit Till and Anne Frank in the afterlife.

For more information contact:

Jaz Dorsey

Dramaturg

The African American Playwrights Exchange

615-915-0891

Come to Nashville and Go to the Theatre.

AAPEX Very Short Halloween Play Contest Winner: Dr. Mary Weems

I'm pleased to announce that playwright Dr. Mary E. Weems has won our first Very Short Halloween Play Contest. By "Very Short," I mean a one-pager or less. You can read it below. Thanks to all who entered.

Jaz Dorsey

Get Ghost!

Mary E.Weems, Ph.D.

Characters:

Grim Reaper: Young Black male, 13 years old

Jamie: Young Black male, 13 years old

(Setting: Inner City Street. Halloween Night—Today)

(Young man walks out slowly wearing a long sheet w/holes cut out for eyes and mouth).

Jamie: Whoooooooo!!!!! Whooooooooo!!!!! Boooooooooo!!!!!!! (Notices audience).

This is my favorite time-a year, just before it gets cold, before report cards come out, before baby sister gets home from her daddy’s house.

(Grim Reaper runs across stage behind Jamie screaming. Jamie jumps, runs almost to edge of stage).

Jamie: What the—Oh Huh, bet you thought that scared me hunh? Hell naw—I just turned thirteen and mama said I’m a young man now. We did this ritual where she told me the story of my great-great grandfather—how he was a slave long time ago but didn’t last long cause the first time he was sent off the Plantation he was stopped by some stranger white folks lookin’ for a runaway slave. They tried to get him to tell on his friend Joe who was tryin’ to come what mama calls up North, but my great-great wouldn’t even give his own name. Joe heard everything cause they’d just been walkin’ together. He cried while he watched them beat my great-great grandfather senseless. Watched them drag him away. After that he run off but stopped long enough to tell another slave what happened. Mama said nobody saw her great-grandfather any more—It was Halloween that night too, mama said a full moon was out. Next morning great grandman swore until she died that she saw that old straw hat he used to wear layin’ on the ground in front of the big house door.

(Reaper walks across the stage carrying the hat in front of him while the boy turns)

Jamie: Hey! Wait a minute! Whose hat is that, wait!

Reaper; What do you want? It’s Halloween, I’m workin’ here—you know the scare business is big around here and it’s almost midnight—

Jamie: What you doin’ in this neighborhood?

Reaper: What you mean? Didn’t I just tell you I’m in the scare business? What are you doin’ dressed like a homeless ghost? Hmmmmm?

Jamie: Is that supposed to be funny?

Reaper: Nooooooooooooooooooooooo!!! (Shakes his shaft) It’s not, I’m not into comedy.

Jamie: And I’m not into costumes—Long time ago I went out on a night just like this. Mama thought I was going out with my friends Kenny, Johnny and Billy. They lived right down this street. When I went by their house they were already gone. It was raining hard that night, but I saw them a few blocks ahead on the other side of the street. I started to run. I hollered hey ya’ll wait up—and

Reaper: And?

Jamie: I slipped on the street, got ran over by a taxicab.

Reaper: What you mean?

Jamie: I mean I’m not into costumes---this don’t come off, get it? Now, get Ghost!

(Stage goes to Black)

(Spotlight. Straw hat sits upstage center)

The End

AAPEX Interview: Dr. Mary Weems

Dr. Mary Weems

One of the most compelling scripts to come across my desk in recent months is a play called MEAT by Dr. Mary Weems , Assistant Professor in the Department of Education and Allied Studies at John Carroll University in University Heights, Ohio.

MEAT, which received a reading at this year's National Black Theatre Festival, deals with the career of Cleveland serial killer Anthony Sowell who, over a three year period, claimed the lives of 11 women. The victims are evoked by a trio of women who reference the three witches in MACBETH, and the play's structure is intense and visceral.

On another note, Weems is also the author of AT LAST, a revue of monologues and songs recalling the lives of such American legends as Zora Neal Hurston, Billie Holiday, Etta James, Bessie Smith and others.

I asked Dr. Weems to tell us something about herself and her work and this is what she has to say:

What role did theatre and the arts play in your childhood and upbringing?

I first experienced plays as a reader. I only went to see live plays (for the most part at Karamu) when we went on a field trip at whatever school I was attending until I became an adult, but the arts have always been part of my life. I grew up po’ during segregation (then integration) and living in all Black neighborhoods back then meant visual art, live music, song and dance was part of what was happening—since we all had to live together this included artists, many who probably worked in the Black clubs, restaurants, and bars not far from where we lived. My grandfather used to belong to a band and played guitar, my grandmother and mother loved to draw, various relatives sang in the choir etc. Also, visits to the Cleveland Museum of Art were free.

Tell us about your own evolution as an artist.

I started writing in a Black and White composition notebook I kept in an Amazon puzzle box my grandmother gave me when I was thirteen to overcome low self-esteem and to get to know myself. For most of my young life I didn’t share what I wrote with anyone but my grandmother who used to tell me she didn’t understand it but knew it was good. This lack of exposure, study, guidance, etc. meant my work didn’t grow. When I was in my early 30s, I left a lower level corporate position when the company I’d worked for almost thirteen years reorganized, and got serious about college. I took a class with a native Irish poet and something in the vibe between us encouraged me to show her some of my poems. The following week she kept me in her office for over an hour discussing my work, pointing out that I had my own poetic voice and asking “Now what are you going to do with it?” This question led to a re-assessment of my life goals. I was on my way to law school, but when I considered the possibility of actually doing what I love (writing, performing, teaching) for a living I shifted gears and pursued a Masters in English with an emphasis in Creative Writing, followed by a Ph.D. in Education. My work began to grow as soon as I added the additional layers of pertinent college classes, workshops, editing, open mike readings in the community and publication to the extensive reading and writing I’d been doing almost twenty years by then. In terms of evolution much of my published and/or performed work has been as a poet and/or artist-scholar, but I think my recent work as a playwright reflects the most growth I’ve had in a relatively short period of time in my career. In terms of people I’ve worked with, I’d like to thank fellow playwright Sandra Perlman, the only instructor I had in this genre, my friend and favorite director Tony Sias, MFA, the Director of Theatre and Fine Arts for the Cleveland Metropolitan School District, Michael Oatman for encouraging me to get my plays out into the world and Black Poetic. Beyond what I’ve learned and continue to learn from each of them, don’t ask me to articulate the ‘why’ of this evolution, I have no idea—I just pray it keeps coming.

As a playwright, you tackle some pretty tough subjects in such plays as MEAT and DUNKING. Why do you go to these dark and disturbing places?

I don’t intentionally go anyplace. Places, personal experiences, incidents, tragedies, moments, lines take me and my job is to get what’s coming through me down on the page as quickly as possible. When I’m inspired to write I feel as if I’m filling up with words. What I write about usually involves the human condition or what happens to me and others I encounter or imagine between birth and goodbye and there’s usually a sense of the complexity involved in living day-to-day, which always includes drama of some kind. When you’ve lived through decades as an adult language artist, you have a lot to draw from in terms of both knowledge and experience, and I’ve always been most interested in writing about things that have some kind of social, cultural and/or political bent. Beyond that writing is a more spiritual, organic process for me.

What is your take on Cleveland as a theatre town?

I think regional, local and community theatres here are accomplishing small miracles given the economy and the declining audience for live theater nationally. As someone who thinks giving local artists places to do their work should be part of each theatre’s game plan, I’m especially excited by the Cleveland Public Theatre’s Ingenuity Festival, the Cleveland Playhouse’s FusionFest, Dobama Theatre's GYM, and Terrence Spivey, Artistic Director of Karamu’s commitment to featuring the work of local playwrights and other artists. Cleveland’s blessed to have a committed theatre community including (not trying to leave anyone out) The Beck Center, and the Ensemble and East Cleveland Theatres.

Interview by Jaz Dorsey.