Slave Play
Slave Play | |
---|---|
Written by | Jeremy O. Harris |
Characters |
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Date premiered | November 19, 2018 |
Place premiered | interracial relationships |
Official site |
Slave Play is a three-act play by
Harris originally wrote the play in his first year at the
Characters
- Kaneisha – A 28-year-old black woman who is in a relationship with Jim. She plays as a slave in the first act and she has anhedonia. She speaks in a natural Southern dialect throughout.
- Jim – A 35-year-old wealthy white man who is in a relationship with Kaneisha. He plays a slave overseer in the first act, and has a British accent in the following acts.
- Phillip – A 30-year-old mixed-race man who is in a relationship with Alana. He plays a mulatto servant in the first act and he has anhedonia.
- Alana – A 36-year-old white woman who is in a relationship with Phillip. She plays a mistress in the first act.
- Dustin – A 28-year-old gay white man who is in a relationship with Gary. He is "a white man but the lowest type of white—dingy, and off-white." He plays as an indentured servant in the first act.
- Gary – A 27-year-old gay black man who is in a relationship with Dustin. He plays a black overseer in the first act and he has anhedonia.
- Teá – A 26-year-old mixed-race woman who is in a relationship with Patricia. She studies black feminism and queer theory, and is holding a study in Racialized Inhibiting Disorder in interracial couples with Patricia.
- Patricia – A 30-year-old light-skinned brown woman who is in a relationship with Teá. She studies cognitive psychology, and is holding a study in Racialized Inhibiting Disorder in interracial couples with Teá.[9]
Plot
Act One: "Work"
Act One begins at McGregor Plantation, a southern
The scene transitions to the boudoir of Madame McGregor, the wife of Master McGregor. Madame McGregor, or Alana, calls upon Phillip, her mulatto servant, and asks him to play the fiddle. Phillip begins to play Beethoven's Op. 132. Alana stops him, calling European music boring, and asks him to play "negro" music. Phillip plays "Pony" by Ginuwine and Alana dances, then initiates sex, saying she is under Phillip's mulatto spell.[11] She then uses a dildo to penetrate him, asking him if he likes being in the woman's position.[13] Phillip replies that he is unsure.[11]
In the McGregor's barn, Gary, a black slave, is in charge of Dustin, a white indentured servant. Gary taunts Dustin, finding their allocation of power amusing. Gary kicks Dustin down, calling him lesser than other white people.[11] The song “Multi-Love” by Unknown Mortal Orchestra begins to play. The two fight before they engage in sexual intimacy.[2] Gary has Dustin lick Gary's boot clean; this causes Gary to orgasm. He suddenly starts crying and cannot be comforted by Dustin.[11]
The scene shifts back to the other couples. Phillip keeps playing music that Alana does not like on his fiddle and Kaneisha and Jim are engaged in sex. Kaneisha asks again to be called a "negress." Even as Kaneisha nears orgasm, Jim stops participating when Kaneisha calls him "Masta Jim". Jim then switches to speaking in a British accent and tells Kaneisha that he is not comfortable with the situation.[11] Jim uses his safeword,[12] "Starbucks," to end the encounter.[11]
Suddenly, new characters in modern clothing, Patricia and Teá (also an interracial couple[13]) come into the room. They recommend for the three couples to meet back at the main house soon.[11] It is revealed that in reality the characters are modern couples participating in a role-playing exercise meant to improve intimacy between white and black partners.[12]
Act Two: "Process"
The second act is dedicated to a contemporary
Dustin begins by noting that Gary came, which he could not do before, but Gary counters that Dustin was uncomfortable in making his whiteness hyper-visible. Alana enjoyed the release of the fantasy and asks Phillip if he enjoyed it too, noting that he got an erection when he had trouble before.[14] Jim keeps interrupting speakers with laughter; Teá asks him to share, especially since he was the one who said the safeword. Jim is confused and overwhelmed by the therapy. Teá clarifies that the therapy, titled Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy, was designed to help black partners feel pleasure again with their white partners. Jim is uncomfortable playing the role of the slave overseer and demeaning his wife, and believes the experience is traumatizing and ruining his relationship with Kaneisha. Kaneisha feels frustrated and betrayed that Jim did not give what she asked of him.[14]
After Patricia and Teá read back to the group what they have said, Alana points out that mostly white men are speaking. Dustin insists that he is not white. Dustin and Gary get back into an old argument over Dustin wanting to move into a more gentrified neighborhood. Dustin refuses to label himself as white, and Gary feels that through this he erases Gary's identity.[14] Phillip, who has not spoken much, says that the therapy seems fake to him. Alana speaks over him, still upset about Jim saying the safeword.[14]
Patricia and Teá explain the origins of Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy in treating anhedonia, with Patricia speaking over Teá. The couple shaped it as their
Phillip says none of his partners are able to see him as black and he struggles with being mixed race. Gary realizes that the song he often hears, “Multi-Love”, was imagined due to "musical obsession disorder." Kaneisha says she felt in control during the fantasy play, but Jim took that away from her by using the safeword; Gary agrees but Phillip does not. It is revealed that Phillip and Alana met because her ex-husband had a
Jim starts to read something he wrote on his phone. He does not understand why Kaneisha looks at him with disgust, like he is "a virus," nor does he know what he is supposed to do. Kaneisha realizes that "virus" is the description she has been searching for, referencing the diseases introduced by Europeans which
Act Three: "Exorcise"
In the third act,[10] "Work" plays as Kaneisha is packing in a room and Jim comes in. Kaneisha says that what she needs isn't better communication, but for Jim to simply listen. Jim is silent as Kaneisha recounts how they met, and then times in her childhood when she had to visit plantations on school field trips. As the only black girl, she felt a need to act proud for her "elders" watching her. She says she fell in love with Jim, a white man, because he was not American.[15] Jim begins to initiate foreplay and the music rises while Kaneisha continues that the relationship went downhill three years ago, when she stopped feeling sexual pleasure because she began to see him as foreign and frightening. She saw Jim's whiteness and power, and that he also has "the virus", because though he is not American, he benefits from being white while being unaware of the privilege that whiteness gives him. She says that Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy and the fantasy play gave her a sense of peace because she feels the elders watching her again; the elders do not care that she is with "a demon / who thinks he’s a saint", but simply want the two of them to know he is a demon.[15]
Suddenly, Jim calls Kaneisha a "negress" and gags her; the music stops. Jim returns to performing his slave owner role, dominating and insulting Kaneisha. She silently consents to continue, but when Jim initiates forceful sex she struggles free and screams the safeword. She begins to cry, then laugh, and Jim cries as well as they comfort each other. Kaneisha stands and thanks Jim for listening.[16]
Themes
Slave Play deals with the themes of race, sex, power relations, trauma, and
By staging a conversation between slavery and the present, the play uses the theme of time and history to depict how the trauma of slavery persists.[17] As Tonya Pinkins writes, racism does not have a safe word in the play, and throughout the narrative, white characters are forced to recognize their historical and social locations in relation to their partners.[8] The play dwells on the impact of black erasure in interracial relationships.[10] Throughout the narrative, the white partners are incapable of recognizing, or naming, their partners race, rather it is because of guilt, or because they get defensive.[10] By placing sex and racial dynamics in juxtaposition through the Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy, the play makes whiteness, and white privilege, hyper visible in interracial relationships.[10] Soraya Nadia McDonald points out that the play works to uncover racial innocence.[13] Racial innocence is the concept that white people are innocent of race, and therefore they are racially neutral.[18] By placing the white characters in the position of the master, the mistress, or the indentured servant, the play makes whiteness visible to the white characters.[13]
Background
Author Jeremy O. Harris has said that he wrote Slave Play during his first year at the
Production history
Off-Broadway (2018)
The play was announced for the 2018–2019 season of the
Previews of the production at NYTW, under the patronage of the production company Seaview Productions, began on November 19, 2018.[30] Due to high demand, the duration of the show's run was extended before the official December 9 premiere, with the final performance being postponed from the original closing date of December 30, 2018, to January 13, 2019.[31] Over the next two weeks, tickets for all performances sold out.[32][33]
Broadway (2019)
On September 18, 2019, the play ran and hosted a Broadway Blackout night where the audience consisted of only black identified artists, writers, or students.[34] The play began its Broadway run at the John Golden Theatre in October 2019.[35][36] The play opened its 17-week limited Broadway engagement on October 6, 2019, and closed as scheduled on January 19, 2020.[36][37] Harris and his team promised that 10,000 tickets would be sold at $39 in an effort to diversify the crowd.[38]
In June 2020, the producers and creative team of Slave Play made a donation of $10,000 (~$11,599 in 2023) to the National Bailout Fund and released a statement in support of Black Lives Matter.[39]
Broadway remount (2021)
In September 2021, it was announced that a new engagement of the play will run at the August Wilson Theatre from November 23, 2021, to January 23, 2022, with plans to then transfer to Los Angeles. Most of the cast returned, with the exception of Joaquina Kalukango, due to a prior commitment to the pre-Broadway run of Paradise Square; she was replaced by Antoinette Crowe-Legacy, who originated the role of Kaneisha at the Yale School of Drama. The producers said they intended to repeat their previous efforts to sell 10,000 tickets for $39 each.[40] The production later transferred to the Center Theatre Group's Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles from February 9 to March 13, 2022, after plans to stage it in 2020 were delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[41]
West End (2024)
In February 2024, it was announced that the production would transfer to London's West End for a limited engagement. The show is expected to begin performances from 29 June 2024 at the Noël Coward Theatre and is scheduled to run through 21 September 2024. Appearing in the cast will be Fisayo Akinade, Kit Harington, Aaron Heffernan, and Olivia Washington, alongside James Cusati-Moyer, Chalia La Tour, Annie McNamara, and Irene Sofia Lucio, all four of whom are expected to reprise their respective roles from the original Broadway production.[42] "Black Out" nights return in this run, wherein two performances will be exclusively available for black-identifying audience members, facilitated through partnerships with outside organizations.[43][44] Additionally, a select number of tickets will be reserved for each performance as pay-what-you-can, along with an additional selection of £20 tickets released each performance day.[45]
Roles and principal casts
Character | Off-Broadway | Broadway | Broadway Remount | Los Angeles |
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2018 | 2019 | 2021 | 2022 | |
Kaneisha | Teyonah Parris | Joaquina Kalukango | Antoinette Crowe-Legacy | |
Jim | Paul Alexander Nolan | |||
Phillip | Sullivan Jones | Jonathan Higginbotham | ||
Alana | Annie McNamara | Elizabeth Stahlmann | ||
Dustin | James Cusati-Moyer | Devin Kawaoka | ||
Gary | Ato Blankson-Wood | Jakeem Dante Powell | ||
Teá | Chalia La Tour | |||
Patricia | Irene Sofia Lucio |
Reception
Critical reception of Slave Play has been polarized.[3][8] Due to themes revolving around sexuality and slavery, reviewers have either defended the play or criticized it.[46] In particular, Harris believes that making a play palatable would be buying into respectability politics, and reviewers such as Tim Teeman and Soraya Nadia McDonald have noted how Slave Play's explicit content is utilized to critique racism in the United States.[10][13][46]
There have been petitions to shut down Slave Play because of its themes.[47] In particular, audience members and writers have criticized the play for its treatment of Black women characters, and voicing that it disrespects the violent history of rape in chattel slavery.[47] In 2018, a petition titled "Shutdown Slave Play" was started, with the petitioner describing the play as traumatizing and exploitative of human atrocities.[47] Critic Elisabeth Vincentelli noted the similarities between the themes and style of Slave Play and those of the plays An Octoroon (2014) and Underground Railroad Game (2016).[48][49]
Despite the controversy, many reviewers have met the play with acclaim.[8] Peter Marks describes the play as funny and scalding, while Sara Holden wrote that Harris manages to make every character an archetype while at the same giving them depth.[50][12] Positive reviews of the play herald Slave Play as both confronting racism and unpacking the nuances of interracial relationships, and cite it as comedic and entertaining.[50][12] Aisha Harris wrote about the experience of seeing Slave Play as a Black woman, stating that the uncomfortable narrative of the play allows for productive thought.[17]
Other reviewers have reviewed the play negatively. Thom Geier reviewed the play as intentionally designed to provoke, and calls the play uneven.[2] Juan Michael Porter II, a Black theater writer, reviewed the play as consisting of oversimplified confessions meant to titillate the audience.[51]
Black Out performances
The concept of the
Awards and nominations
Original Off-Broadway production
Year | Award | Category | Nominee | Result |
---|---|---|---|---|
2019 | Lucille Lortel Awards[6] | Best Play | Nominated | |
Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play | Ato Blankson-Wood | Nominated | ||
Drama Desk Award[7] | Outstanding Lighting Design for a Play | Jiyoun Chang | Nominated | |
Outstanding Fight Choreography | Claire Ward | Won | ||
Outer Critics Circle Award[55]
|
John Gassner Award | Jeremy O. Harris | Nominated |
Original Broadway production
Year | Award | Category | Nominee | Result |
---|---|---|---|---|
2020 | Tony Awards[56] | Best Play | Nominated | |
Best Leading Actress in a Play | Joaquina Kalukango | Nominated | ||
Best Featured Actor in a Play | Ato Blankson-Wood | Nominated | ||
James Cusati-Moyer | Nominated | |||
Best Featured Actress in a Play | Chalia La Tour | Nominated | ||
Annie McNamara | Nominated | |||
Best Direction of a Play | Robert O'Hara | Nominated | ||
Best Original Score | Lindsay Jones | Nominated | ||
Best Scenic Design of a Play
|
Clint Ramos | Nominated | ||
Best Costume Design of a Play
|
Dede Ayite | Nominated | ||
Best Lighting Design of a Play
|
Jiyoun Chang | Nominated | ||
Best Sound Design of a Play
|
Lindsay Jones | Nominated | ||
Drama League Awards[57]
|
Outstanding Production of a Play | Nominated | ||
Distinguished Performance Award | Ato Blankson-Wood | Nominated | ||
Outer Critics Circle Award[58]
|
Outstanding Actress in a Play | Joaquina Kalukango | Honoree | |
GLAAD Media Award[59] | Outstanding Broadway Production | Nominated |
References
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- ^ The Wrap. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b c d e Lapacazo Sandoval, Contributing Writer. "'Slave Play' by Jeremy O. Harris a Real Look at Racism in America —Opening on Broadway, Oc-Tober 6." Los Angeles Sentinel (CA), October 9, 2019.
- ^ Daniels, Karu F. (January 7, 2019). "Rising Playwright Jeremy O. Harris Addresses Backlash Over Controversial Slave Play". The Root. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b Cuby, Michael (March 8, 2019). "For Jeremy O. Harris, Playwriting Is Just the Beginning". them. Condé Nast. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b Gans, Andrew (April 3, 2019). "Nominations for 34th Annual Lucille Lortel Awards Announced; Carmen Jones and Rags Parkland Sings the Songs of the Future Lead the Pack". Playbill. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b Fierberg, Ruthie (July 2, 2019). "Tootsie, Hadestown, and The Ferryman Lead 2019 Drama Desk Award Winners". Playbill. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b c d PINKINS, TONYA. “Racism Doesn’t Have a Safe Word.” American Theatre, vol. 36, no. 6, July 2019, pp. 40–41.
- ^ Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 39-67.
- ^ a b c d e f g Teeman, Tim (September 12, 2018). "What Makes Jeremy O. Harris' 'Slave Play' Such a Powerful Play About Racism". The Daily Beast. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 42-50
- ^ Vulture. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b c d e McDonald, Soraya Nadia (December 14, 2018). "The subversive 'Slave Play' peels back the veneer of racial innocence in Northern whites". Andscape. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
- ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 50-64
- ^ a b Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 64-67
- Vulture. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
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- ^ Cox, Gordon (April 17, 2018). "Beth Henley, J.T. Rogers and Sarah DeLappe Set for 2018 O'Neill Playwrights Conference". Variety. Retrieved October 1, 2019.
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- ^ "One year ago today, SLAVE PLAY by Jeremy O. Harris (NPC '18) had its first public reading on our campus". Eugene O'Neill Theater Center. Twitter. July 25, 2019. Retrieved October 2, 2019.
- ^ McNerney, Pem (July 31, 2019). "From Baked Goods to Broadway Productions: Shoreline Trio Tackles One of the Hottest Plays of the Season". Zip06. Shore Publishing. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
- ^ Clement, Olivia (December 7, 2018). "Slave Play Extends Another 2 Weeks at NYTW". Playbill. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
- ^ Harris, Jeremy O. (December 21, 2018). "The @nytimes is making me love @Mr_NaveenKumar even more than I did last month with this beautiful #tbt. Slave Play sold out but get a @vineyardtheatre MEMBERSHIP to guarantee a "Daddy" ticket!". Twitter. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
- ^ Peitzman, Louis (December 21, 2018). "The Best Plays And Musicals Of 2018". BuzzFeed News. Retrieved September 30, 2019.
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- ^ Evans, Greg (June 4, 2020). "'Slave Play' Team Pledges $10K To National Bailout Fund, Challenges Broadway Community". Deadline. Retrieved June 5, 2020.
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- ^ Evans, Greg (October 13, 2021). "'Slave Play' Back On Track For Los Angeles After Venue Pledges Commitment To Address Gender Imbalance". Deadline. Retrieved February 19, 2024.
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- ISSN 0307-1235. Retrieved February 28, 2024.
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- ^ Vincentelli, Elisabeth (December 15, 2018). "I have seen it. And i have also seen the plays it rips off, namely An Octoroon and Underground Railroad Game". Twitter. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
- ^ Vincentelli, Elisabeth (December 17, 2018). "I'll rephrase: the play covers very similar thematic and aesthetic grounds the earlier ones did, just not as imaginatively or skillfully". Twitter. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
- ^ a b Marks, Peter (October 6, 2019). "'Slave Play' Is a Funny, Scalding, Walk along the Boundary between Black and White in America". The Washington Post.
- ^ Porter II, Juan Michael (October 15, 2019). "Despite the Hype, I Hated 'Slave Play' [Op-Ed]". COLORLINES.
- New York Times. Retrieved March 3, 2024.
- ^ Lukowski, Andrzej (February 29, 2024). "Why are Black audiences-only London theatre nights causing a scandal?". Time Out. Retrieved March 3, 2024.
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