Nychelle tells how her own story relates to this exceptional play based on the Jena 6 episode two decades ago when nooses were hung on a tree near a Louisiana high school.
On December 4, 2006, six African-American teenagers beat up a fellow white football player at their high school in Jena, Louisiana. Quickly tagged the Jena Six case, the incident dominated headlines from coast to coast for weeks.
In Blood at the Root currently making its West Coast premiere at the Atwater Village Theatre, playwright Dominique Morisseau—a MacArthur Genius Grant Fellow and Tony Award Nominee—leverages the resultant controversy to take the most profound look imaginable at the state of racism in America 17 years ago—and today.
Especially poignant in the current “anti-woke” era of rising anti-Black bigotry, coupled with today’s growing tide of homophobia thinly disguised as an effort to “protect our children,” Morisseau’s 2014 masterpiece is no mere polemic on racism’s dire effects.
Rather, under the deft hand of director Michael A. Shepperd, Blood is a multilayered examination of the full range of challenges today’s youngsters face—racism and homophobia, yes, but also colorism, interracial romance, soul-crushing isolation, and more.
Nychelle Hawk and Jeremy Reiter IIAction starts on a blistering hot day when a young Black student—Raylynn, fancying herself a “rule-breaker”—violates age-old tradition by grabbing some shade in an area known to be reserved for white students, under an historic oak tree called “Ol’ Devoted”. Two of her friends follow Raylynn’s lead. Raylynn, touchingly played by Nychelle Hawk, and her Black friends are stunned the next day to see three nooses hanging from the tree’s lowest limb. School officials and white friends assure them that it’s just a prank, some harmless fun, but the Black kids know better.
The superb acting of the young troupe, coupled with the lyrical dialog and understated but riveting choreography, invites audience members to identify with one character or another—or even several:
- Justin, played by Azeem Vecchio, as the biracial editor of the school’s newspaper who fits with no group on campus and so hides behind his editing chores;
- Toria (Grace Soens) the plain-Jane reporter who never gets asked out on a date and so seeks to make her mark by reporting the school’s real news;
- Colin (Jeremy Reiter II), the star quarterback whose secret sexual orientation could wreck his dreams of making it big in the sports world;
- Asha (Caroline Rose), a white girl who identifies with the Black kids she hangs with, until maybe push comes to shove;
- Raylynn and her brother DeAndre (Nicholas Heard), who are reminded repeatedly that being Black in a white world is a tough way to go, and
- An energetic chorus (Malik Bailey, Deandra Bernando, Emma Bruno, Jack David Sharp, and Amber Tiara), who keep the joint hopping for the whole 90 minutes.
Left: Grace Soens and Azeem Vecchio. Right: Nicholas Heard and Nychelle Hawk.
Whatever you do, don’t miss this one.
Blood at the Root runs September 9 through October 28, 8 p.m. every Friday and Saturday (dark Saturday, Oct. 7); 7 p.m. every other Sunday beginning September 10; and 3 p.m. every other Sunday beginning Sept. 17. There will be one additional performance on Monday, Oct. 9 at 8 p.m. Tickets range from $20 to $30.
Atwater Village Theatre is located at 3269 Casitas Ave in Los Angeles, CA 90039. Parking is free in the ATX (Atwater Crossing) parking lot one block south of the theater. To purchase tickets and for more information call 323.882.6912 or go to www.openfist.org.
