“Motown The Musical” director Charles Randolph-Wright and award-winning producer Kevin McCollum of “Hand to God” talk to Rev. Jacqui Lewis about their work and how stage narratives are stories of hope and faith.
BY ESTHER ZUCKERMAN • @EZWRITES
source: 
NBC announced that it is producing an eight-hour miniseries about love stories on the Underground Railroad, with Stevie Wonder serving as executive producer.
The miniseries, titled Freedom Run, is an adaptation of Betty DeRamus’s 2005 book Forbidden Fruit: Love Stories From the Underground Railroad. It will focus on three “specific epic journeys and love stories, each based on actual people,” according to NBC.
The miniseries will be written by B. Swibel, Adam Westbrook, and Charles Randolph-Wright, who will also executive produce. Per NBC, DeRamus’s book is also being developed as a stage musical for which Swibel, Westbrook, and Randolph-Wright are writing the book and Wonder is attached to compose the score.
BY ANDREW DYS
adys@heraldonline.com
Ruth Johnson, an English teacher and activist for racial equality in western York County for decades, and mother of award-winning writer/director Charles Randolph-Wright, died Thursday. She was 85.
Johnson taught for years at the segregated Jefferson School in York, then at York Comprehensive High School after schools were integrated. During all those years and afterward, she was an activist with the NAACP and other groups and helped create community groups that grappled with race problems in York and other rural parts of York County.
“For people in York and western York County, Ruth Johnson was not just a teacher, she was an inspiration,” said Steve Love, a former student and lifelong friend, and the former Western York NAACP president. “She pushed people to try to achieve their dreams and dare to be great.”
Johnson kept a sign on her wall all her life, even in her last years in assisted care after a stroke, that read: “Average is not good enough.”
“Ruth Johnson was a great woman whose impact on all students in York, and her community, will last forever,” said longtime friend John Spratt, the former congressman from York.
Johnson’s high expectations for greatness among students led her only son to the highest artistic honors in America. Charles Randolph-Wright, who grew up in York before heading off to college at Duke University and then to New York City to launch his career, is a director of such Broadway hits as “Motown” and “Blue,” among others. “Motown” is scheduled to be performed at the Belk Theater in Charlotte in August.
Her son, known throughout the world for his creativity and specifically his portrayal of the black experience, said that without his mother, none of that would have been possible. “My mother was the one great influence on my life, the one who had that profound vision for me – and so many others,” Randolph-Wright said Friday. “She had a great influence on people and her community, state and country.”
Randolph-Wright is establishing a yearly scholarship in his mother’s name for a student from York Comprehensive High School. “Her life’s work was to show the thrilling aspirations that learning brings to all of us,” Randolph-Wright said.
A public viewing is Wednesday from 6-8 and a service is Thursday at 1 at Wesley United Methodist Church, with Spratt, York Mayor Eddie Lee, and other dignitaries speaking about Johnson’s impact on York and York County.
By Andrew Dys,
columnist – adys@heraldonline.com
Longtime York funeral home owner Isaac “Ike” Wright died early Monday morning after a long battle with cancer. He was 65.
Wright has run Wright Funeral Home, now in its 100th year, as his family’s business and the city’s oldest black-owned company.
He was far more than a businessman, though.
His generosity with the community and families, taking care of people of any economic and social station, was well-known not just in York, but throughout the region, said York Mayor Eddie Lee.
A tall man with an ever-present smile, Lee said, Wright was larger than life.
“Ike Wright’s compassion, his generosity, his way of dealing with people his whole life, showed so many people the way to be a friend,” Lee said.
Wright was a lifelong advocate for York, generous with community and volunteer organizations all his life.
The Rev. Anthony Johnson, former NAACP president and pastor at Mount Zion Baptist Church, who worked for Wright for the past decade at the funeral home, said York has lost an icon.
“Ike Wright truly was a great man,” he said.
York has lost a leader who helped shape the city, said Charles Johnson, a longtime friend.
“Ike Wright was a fixture, a legend, in York,” Johnson said. “He will be missed by so many people.”
Wright’s daughter, Bridget, who works in the family business, said arrangements for the funeral are pending.
Through the past four decades, Ike Wright was always generous with others in the funeral business, said Kenny Bratton of Bratton Funeral Home in York.
“Any time I ever needed anything, Ike Wright was there for me or anyone else,” Bratton said. “York has lost a man who loved his city, and his city loved him. He was not just well known, he was well respected.”
Wright was a longtime member of the Western York County branch of the NAACP and took an active, leadership role in the politics and social concerns that affected people.
“He took me under his wing and was a supporter when I went into politics,” said state Rep. John King, D-Rock Hill, a second-generation funeral director himself. “Our families were always very close and supported each other. Many of us who knew him well called him ‘Ikey.’
“Ikey in his business had the highest standards, and in his life he had the highest standards. He will be greatly missed.”
Read more here: http://www.heraldonline.com/news/local/news-columns-blogs/andrew-dys/article12286016.html#storylink=cpy
StarTribune
by Rohan Preston
Read the original article here: http://www.startribune.com/children-s-theatre-has-big-dreams-for-akeelah-and-the-bee/324125331/#5
Children’s Theatre has high hopes for “Akeelah and the Bee,” which will get an East Coast showcase after its local
‘Go big, or go home.”
That could be the motto of the Children’s Theatre Company as it kicks off its 50th-anniversary season with the buzzy premiere of “Akeelah and the Bee.”
Playwright Cheryl West’s adaptation of the inspirational film about a spelling-bee prodigy opens Friday in Minneapolis under the eye of celebrated Broadway director Charles Randolph-Wright (“Motown: The Musical”).
It’s a high-wattage effort brimming with ambition. Three weeks after closing in Minneapolis, the production will open for a six-week run at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. — just a short hop for curious New York producers.
Anticipation around “Akeelah” recalls a similar excitement in 2002, when “A Year With Frog and Toad” premiered in Minneapolis before transferring to Times Square.
Although the production team is made up of Broadway veterans and the cast includes two local stars with Broadway credits (Greta Oglesby and James A. Williams), CTC artistic director Peter Brosius is trying to tamp down expectations of a New York transfer.
“What’s so fun is that we not only get to make work that’s inspiring and delightful for our audience at home but also nationally,” he said. “Like we did with ‘Frog and Toad,’ we’re building new relationships and partnerships.”
CTC — the nation’s largest theater for youth and families — has frequently seeded the field with commissions of new plays
as well as book adaptations, but this is the first time the company has tried to turn a feature film into a stage production.
“Akeelah” is based on writer/director Doug Atchison’s 2006 movie about an 11-year-old girl in difficult circumstances who loves to spell and to learn.
Akeelah lost her father to gun violence. She lives with her mother, who is still mourning her husband’s passing. With the help of a visiting professor, Dr. Larabee, who is grieving his daughter’s death at about Akeelah’s age, and with the deep support from her urban community, Akeelah competes successfully in the National Spelling Bee.
Starring Laurence Fishburne as Dr. Larabee and Angela Bassett as Akeelah’s mother, the film was an indie hit, grossing $18 million at the box office and $25 million more through DVD sales.
It was Essence Stiggers, a frequent student performer at CTC, who suggested to Brosius that it might make a good stage show. (She’s an understudy in this production.) Through the film’s producer, a former board member of the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, where Brosius worked for a dozen years, Brosius landed a phone call with Atchison.
The stage version is different from the film in various ways. Playwright West, who adapted “Lizzie Bright and the Buckminster Boy” for CTC in 2012, has cut some characters and combined others. She also has changed the setting from Los Angeles to her hometown of Chicago, which, sadly, has been wracked by gun violence.
Atchison approves of the adaptation.
“The story is of a girl on a journey who’s saddled with the kinds of doubts we all have but comes to realize that with the support of her community, she can see the talent, beauty and love that’s all around her,” he said. “The themes and intent of the story are all there, and Cheryl, and Charles, using their great skills, have translated it into another medium so it can have this other life.”
Atchison added that he is especially fond of the Children’s Theatre. “Every community should have one,” he said.
Breakout role?
Onstage, the role of Akeelah will be originated by relative newcomer Johannah Easley, whom her director and castmates describe as “a stage natural.”
“I saw a lot of actors, and Johannah has the attitude, the instincts, the smarts, everything that you want for a character like this,” said director Randolph-Wright.
Even though this show marks her big break, Easley, 16, a student of St. Paul Conservatory for Performing Artists, grew up in the theater. From the time she was knee-high to a flea, she was in the rehearsal room for shows by Journey Productions, a culturally rooted company run by producer/director Tonia Williams that has done African-American riffs on fairy- and folk tales as well as original productions.
Easley also has studied at companies based in north Minneapolis, including Art of Dance and Hollywood Studios as well as the Plymouth Christian Youth Center, where her mentors included Oglesby and fellow cast member Dennis Spears.
“This child, ooh, she’s going to blow some minds,” said Spears. “She’s so skilled, but what’s amazing is that she knows, intuitively, what is the best thing for her character.”
The all-star cast includes Aimee K. Bryant, Nathan Barlow and Shawn Hamilton, all of whom spoke of their roles in terms that suggest this is not just a regular gig, but something of a mission.
This is a “rare” story, said Oglesby, who plays a good-hearted busybody. With the level of violence in urban neighborhoods, she said it’s important that people in those communities have opportunities to dream.
“It’s such a positive story of family and community coming together around this wonderful girl against the odds,” said Oglesby. “She’s got this loving community that embraces her, undergirds her. It’s such a positive message that we need so badly in times like these.”
Culture shapes how people see each other, Bryant said.
“We need the world to see us the way we know ourselves,” she said. “I grew up in Detroit in the ’80s when people were getting shot for silk shirts and Starter jackets. That was bad, but that’s not all there was. This play shows the other side of that.”
‘Essential theater’
The show is especially sweet for Randolph-Wright and playwright West, both of whom hail from families filled with educators. In fact, Randolph-Wright, a Duke graduate, has relatives in the Twin Cities, including the Purvises of Golden Valley, who are prominent in education and business.
An in-demand director, Randolph-Wright deflected entreaties to take on more lucrative projects during this period. “This is essential theater,” he said. West agreed.
“It’s a celebration of all the people who make up these communities and do great things to support each other but are unsung,” she said. “Every community has them — or used to — people who watch out for the kids, who teach them and cheer them on.”
It might be a cliché, but as Akeelah learned — and CTC already knows — it takes a village to support a dream.
When you’re setting a play in a country you’ve never visited, it’s certainly a good idea to run the piece by people with more intimate knowledge of the place. This was the task dramatist Charles Randolph-Wright dutifully performed in getting his new work, “Love in Afghanistan,” up on its feet.
“We just got Janet’s notes,” he was informed one day at Arena Stage, where the drama, about an American rapper who falls in love with an Afghan interpreter, begins its world-premiere run Friday. The Janet in question was Janet Napolitano, who, you might be aware, recently left her post as secretary of Homeland Security and who, it is reliably reported, is both an avid theatergoer and an acquaintance of Arena’s artistic director, Molly Smith.
Read the full article here.
Playwright Charles Randolph-Wright reflects on his new play, “Love in Afghanistan,” during its world premier at the Arena Stage in Washington, D.C.
Playwright Charles Randolph-Wright redefines the boundaries of romance during wartime.
Charles Randolph-Wright can’t believe his good fortune. He’s about to introduce the world premiere of Love in Afghanistan at Arena Stage; he’s already getting overtures for screen adaptations of the play; and he recently watched musical luminaries Diana Ross, Stevie Wonder and Smoky Robinson rush the stage to praise his direction of Motown on Broadway. “The curtain call for Motown was one of those inexplicable moments—one you hope to come remotely close to once in your career,” says Randolph-Wright, who, along with producing for film and TV, is a resident playwright at Arena Stage.
Love in Afghanistan is his ninth work for Arena—previous productions have included Blue and the Pulitzer Prize-winning Ruined—and it’s by far the most daring. He read stories in The New York Times and other publications a few years ago about the Afghan practice of bacha posh, where Afghan families without sons will pick a daughter to behave and dress like a boy to gain honor and, for poor families, to obtain work. “I was mesmerized,” he says. “I wondered what happens when girls—who pretend to be boys from the age of 5—grow up. How do they navigate the world?” For most, the question is cocktail-party fodder. For Randolph-Wright, the issue is chased and cornered until it becomes a new play.
Because of suggested travel restrictions to Afghanistan, Randolph-Wright was unable to visit the country while writing. Instead, “Afghanistan came to me,” he says. “It’s one of the most inspiring things that’s ever happened to me. I’ve met so many people—Afghans and Western journalists—one of the most influential was a young woman living in the Midwest named Faheema who was bacha posh. She allowed me to see into her remarkable world.”
The play’s protagonists—Duke and Roya, a Western hip-hop artist and an interpreter who endured bacha posh—tangle with love amid war’s upheaval. Randolph-Wright explains, however, that the play’s title isn’t merely a reflection of human adoration. “It’s about love of country, too,” he says. “Most of us look at Afghanistan as over there. And it’s not—it’s now part of us. If I can’t change the world, I want to influence the people who can. DC is the perfect place for this play. Art is the salve that heals our wounds.”
The odd thing is, both places made him equally happy.
“I went from the Four Seasons Hotel in Geneva to the Holiday Inn Express in Rock Hill, and one world was as exciting as the other,” he says. “It was beyond my expectation how genuine our relationships were after all these years. Being with classmates reminded me what I’d had to do to get to work with (Stevie).”
That’s Randolph-Wright: A ceaseless traveler who gets his mail in New York City, has directed across North America – including “Motown: The Musical,” whose national tour comes to Charlotte’s Belk Theater Tuesday – yet hangs onto the South Carolina house his father built by hand more than half a century ago.