It was a full-on celebration at the 4th Annual Beverly Hills/Hollywood NAACP Theatre Festival held this past weekend at Los Angeles Theatre Center (LATC). Utilizing the theme, “Raise the Curtain,” workshops, performances and discussions reiterated the need for black theater.
DAY ONE: Thursday, August 25
A workshop for students — “Pursuing Arts/Entertainment Thru Higher Education.” Middle school and high school students were invited to tour University of Southern California, hosted by the USC student organization called the Black Entertainment & Theatrical Association. Later the students attend a panel discussion where seasoned professionals give insight into how pursuing higher education contributed to their success in the entertainment industry.
DAY TWO: Friday, August 26
Penny Johnson Jerald, CCH Pounder and Iona Morris
It’s the second day of the NAACP Theater Festival and there’s an impressive crowd standing outside LATC’s Theatre 2 awaiting the opening night/world premiere performance of song and dance man Obba Babatunde’s A Tribute to Sammy Davis Jr.
Mere minutes before the doors are flung open and the throng rushes in, actress Iona Morris, who is near the front of the line, turns around, throws her hands in the air and directs the crowd to “Get happy and celebrate black theater.”
Considering the enthusiastic response she receives — boisterous clapping, hoots and howls — it’s obvious the theatergoers plan to do just that.
Other celebs on hand include Penny Johnson Jerald (Castle), CCH Pounder (The Shield, Avatar, Brothers), Glynn Turman (In Treatment, The Wire) and Kiki Shepard (Showtime at the Apollo, A Different World, Miss Evers Boys).
Babatunde (Dreamgirls, Chicago, Jelly’s Last Jam, Manchurian Candidate, Miss Evers Boys, HBO’s Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, Half & Half, The Silence of the Lambs), accompanied by a six-piece band, glides onto the stage in a white dinner jacket, shirt and black slacks.
There’s a small table upstage with a pic of Sammy Davis Jr. There are also some tap shoes and a black hat.
After welcoming everyone, Babatunde says, “It’s only fitting tonight that I pay homage to Sammy Davis Jr.”
Channeling his idol, Babatunde, who played “Sammy” in 2009 at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego, reminisces about when he was a kid and watched Davis on a black and white television.
“He was unique in his style and grace,” says Babatunde, who adds that he affectionately refers to Davis as “Mr. D”.
Obba Babatunde and Ron Hassan
Babatunde takes the audience on a musical tour via a stint on the congas, tap dancing and revue numbers, before segueing into variety show sketches, an occasional joke and impersonations of Humphrey Bogart, Billie Holiday, Billy Eckstine, Jimmy Stewart, Johnny Mathis and Louis ‘Satchmo’ Armstrong, personalities that are probably lost on the younger set.
A ball of energy on stage, he effortlessly sings his way through “As Time Goes By,” “The Candy Man,” “Ain’t Misbehavin’,” What Kind of Fool Am I?,” “Satin Doll,” “Our Love Is Here to Stay,” “Someone to Watch Over Me,” “Take the A Train” and more.
However, it’s when Babatunde puts on the hat, takes the classic Sammy Davis stance and sings Mr. Bojangles, that he brings down the house.
At the end of his 90-minute set, a choked up Babatunde expresses gratitude for Davis by saying, “I want to thank you for coming through the back door, so I could walk through the front door.”
“Mr. Babatunde was an easy pick to open this festival because he is a world renowned talent,” says Ron Hasson, president of the Beverly Hills/Hollywood NAACP. “His kind of talent needs to be honored in and by our community. He gave a spectacular performance.”
DAY THREE: Saturday, August 27
LATC is abuzz early Saturday morning. Several celebrities and a number of wide-eyed Hollywood hopefuls fill the lobby awaiting the start of six panels and a host of 10-minute plays.
Ann Weldon
The panels include: “Maintaining Sanity in An Insane Business,”"Page to Stage: A Literary Case Study,” “Upping Your Acting Game,” “Elements of Dance I,” “Elements of Dance II” and “A Conversation with the Past, Present and Future of Black Theatre in Los Angeles.”
Veteran actress Ann Weldon (Ma Rainey, Eden) attends the “Maintaining Sanity In An Insane Business” workshop that is one of several produced and moderated by Iona Morris.
“I came to this festival to get more entangled and more involved in this business,” says Weldon. “If this is your profession and your passion it’s important to stay current and find out everything there is to know about the business.”
The panel includes actors Richard Lawson (For Colored Girls, All of Us) and Tina Lifford (Parenthood), casting director Chemin Sylvia Bernard, CSA and Barbara Roberts, who serves as an elected official for Actors’ Equity Association.
The diverse workshop attendees are eager to hear how the veteran actors have navigated their way through the Hollywood maze.
The discussion, which Morris asks to “stay in the room,” ranges from how to audition, preparing, getting the part, pitching oneself to a casting agent, dealing with competition, rejection, how the industry has become electronic and how to register on acting websites.
“Actors give up too much power,” says Lawson, who conducts acting classes. “We think they are more powerful than us. We have got to hold space. You have to understand your purpose. My job is not to make them like me. I’m there to deliver my product.”
Richard Lawson, Tina Lifford and Chemin Sylvia Bernard
“Take ownership of who you are,” says Lifford. “Take advantage of the audition process. It’s your training ground. You get to more of you. The moments that are going to be real are the moments you’ve lived.”
Chemin, who says “It’s magic to watch actors bring a character to life in the room,” cautions the acting hopefuls not to wallow in rejection.
“Just remember,” says Chemin. “It’s either your job or it isn’t.”
The “Upping Your Acting Game” workshop boasts Sheldon Epps, Penny Johnson Jerald and Shirley Jo Finney.
One of the more boisterous workshops is “A Conversation with the Past, Present and Future of Black Theatre in Los Angeles.”
The panel, moderated by Ernest D. Dillihay (Performing Arts and Cultural Facilities Director for the City of Los Angeles Dept. of Cultural Affairs), includes Wren T. Brown (Ebony Repertory Theatre), former Los Angeles City Councilman Robert Farrell, Nancy Renee (Towne Street Theatre), Joahn Webb (NAACP), James Burks (Special Projects Community Arts Division of the City of Los Angeles Dept. of Cultural Affairs), Ron Daniels, Francine Battle (League of Allied Arts) actors Roger Mosley and Iona Morris.
Renee says she found it “ludicrous” when she read an article last year that posed the question, “ Is there still a need for black theater?”
“Of course there is still a need for black theater,” she says. “And if we do not tell our stories, they won’t get told. The play is the thing. It’s a shame when you have no control over your destiny.”
Brown, who says all four of his grandparents were part of the legendary Theater Owners Booking Association, making him a fourth generation theatrical, says “The theater is where I live.”
Brown, 47, adds one of his mandates as one of the founders of the Ebony Repertory Theater (ERT), is “to maintain the highest standard of professional theater.” He notes that when A Raisin in the Sun, which was staged at the Nate Holden Performing Arts Center this spring, re-opens at the Kirk Douglas Theater in Culver City in February 2012, ERT will have paid $250,000 to those who have worked on the company’s productions in the last three years.
“I got involved in this festival because I’m very passionate about the arts and telling our story,” says Brown.
Ernest D. Dillihay
“What gets me is how powerful the arts community is, but they don’t know that are,” says Dillihay, who has been in the arts for 40 years, 20 of which were in Los Angeles. “The arts have the power to transform communities.”
Asked what is the state of black theater in Los Angeles, Dillihay says, “There is a lot of black theater going on, but it’s not concentrated. As usual it’s underfunded. There’s really no black ownership of any facilities in a city this large, there is no performing arts center owned or operated by any black organizations. Most of the budgets are under $500,000. They are non-profits. The point is you’ve got to have ownership. You’ve got to own and sustain a building. It’ll take a generation to get this all together.”
Dillihay stresses that everyone has to get involved.
“We have the most revered artists in the world that came out of our communities and out of our churches and into the mainstream,” he says. “Have any of them over these generations returned to any performing arts center building activity? What about capital investment in property?”
Dillihay says it’s a mystery as to why no one has stepped up and taken the reins.
“That’s a question we still have to answer,” he says. “Some of it is believing you have value, understanding that value, leveraging that value and investing in yourself instead of investing everywhere else. We have a throw-away mentality.”
James Burks, also known as the founding director of the African Marketplace, says getting the black theater online would take a concerted effort from everyone.
James Burks
“I’m not encouraged and I’m not discouraged about where we’re going,” says Burks. “I really believe that we can do a lot. We have to connect the theaters with the educational institutions – those that we control. And then we have to change the perception of elected officials. We just have to focus. We have to get someone elected who really represents the arts. You see, the arts is a micro business. Micro businesses create all these jobs.”
Concerning the state of black theater in Los Angles, Burks has a lot to say.
“It’s not just one state,” he explains. “When you think about black theater, you have to think about the facilities. You have to think about the marketing and promotion of it. You have to think about the economic resources. The education component. Where are the dramaturges? Where are the workshops? There’s a lot of things that go into black theater. It has to be centralized. If it’s centralized, we can do something about it.”
DAY FOUR, Sunday, August 28, 2011
Sunday is chock full of workshops, 10-minute plays and two one-woman shows.
The workshops include: “Business of the Business: Producing for Stage,” “Theater in the Digital Age: New Media Awareness,” “Careers in Arts Management: Leadership in the 21st Century and Actors’ Equity Association: EEO Issues Facing Actors Today.”
The two one-woman shows include Sloan Robinson’s Bananas: A Day In The Life of Josephine Baker and Bonita Brisker’s Billie Holiday.
“This is a great festival,” says Hasson. “It’s always good to stop and take some time to celebrate ourselves.”
* * *Photos from the Beverly Hills/Hollywood NAACP 4th Annual Theatre Festival by Darlene Donloe
The mission of the Beverly Hills/Hollywood NAACP 4th Annual Theatre Festival is to “showcase the talent, creativity, and artistry of performing artists, directors, playwrights, and other contributors to the theatrical process, in order to cultivate awareness of the importance of black theatre in Los Angeles.”
