The Ballad of Emmett Till
What do we know and remember about Emmett Till? Mainly that this 14 year-old was brutally lynched down South in 1955 for purportedly whistling at a white woman, and that at his Chicago funeral his mother insisted on leaving her son’s casket open. The mutilated, partially decomposed corpse was viewed in person by up to 50,000 mourners and by many more in photos published in Jet, helping to inspire the then-nascent Civil Rights movement.
For some reason, The Ballad of Emmett Till, playwright Ifa Beyeza’s version of events at the award-winning Fountain Theatre, omits mentioning the magazine’s publication of these bone-jarring images. Be that as it may, there’s more to the Windy City teenager than the above facts, and Bayeza strives to resurrect him. Bayeza tells Till’s backstory as it was (or as the dramatist imagined it), and a picture emerges of a fatherless lad who struggled with and overcame polio and stuttering.
Surprisingly, for such a tragic tale, The Ballad of Emmett Till is full of good-natured humor, as we follow the fast talking and fun loving Till from his Chicago girl chasing escapades to the city slicker’s attempts to farm and fish with his Mississippi kinfolk. Of course had white supremacists not kidnapped and viciously murdered Till one night in August, 1955 for his alleged infraction of Jim Crow "etiquette," it’s unlikely that Bayeza would have written a play about him. And the haunting question the play raises is what did life hold in store for Till? He may have, like most people, faded into history’s obscurity, or, perhaps, he could have gone on to do especially noteworthy things. But we’ll never know.
A highly stylized production
This play could have easily been presented in a straightforward realist manner, but Bayeza’s script, and Shirley Jo Finney’s direction, have wrought a highly stylized production. (In that "the show must go on" tradition, Finney stepped in after the murder of the play’s original director, Fountain Theatre stalwart Ben Bradley.) Overall this creative rendering and storytelling technique works and serves the drama well. But certain elements lost me, such as the stick dance choreographed by Ameenah Kaplan, performed towards the beginning of the 90-minute one act play. While it’s ably presented, what’s the point? Foreshadowing of looming violence to come? Perhaps this baffled me because I have previously seen numerous indigenous stick dances performed by Micronesians and Filipinos, and I was confused by the cultural context.
Another thing that puzzled me is set designer Scott Siedman’s use of baggage on the small, mostly bare stage of the 78-seat playhouse. Why? Emphasizing that Till traveled all the way from Chicago to Mississippi to visit and stay with his relatives there? That life is a journey? Or that Till and/or his saga carry heavy baggage? Your guess is as good as mine. On the other hand, David B. Marling’s sound design organically underscored and enhanced the drama, as did Kathi O’Donohue’s lighting, especially during a torture sequence that rendered it palpable, but endurable to sit through.
The production features just five actors, who seamlessly move from role to role as effortlessly as shape shifters, playing multiple characters. The ensemble acting is deftly directed by Finney. With his bravura performance Lorenz Arnell has an effervescent presence in the title role, bringing someone mostly known for his death vividly back to life. Arnell makes the ghost of Emmett flesh and blood, transforming an icon into someone all too human.
As the steely-willed Mamie (amongst other roles), who brought her son’s corpse up from the Delta to Chicago for the world to see, Karen Malina White is stellar. As is Adenele Ojo, who displays a comic flair as one of Till’s hayseed Southern cousins or romantic interests, as well as a tragic touch playing Emmett’s older relatives.
The South Carolina-born Bernard Addison captures what W.E.B. DuBois called "the soul of Black folks," crystallizing onstage the sheer terror of the pre-Civil Rights generation subjected to night riders and lynchings in the Old South. When the rednecks come to his spread to apprehend his nephew in the dead of the night, Addison’s character, Uncle Moses, is memorably dumbstruck: the quintessence of being powerless and paralyzed by persecution.
The Ballad of Emmett Till features an all Black cast playing its range of mixed-race characters; but I think the piece would be better served if the woman Till supposedly wolf-whistled at and his oppressors were played by white actors. As performed, the racial tension is mitigated, precisely when it needs to be raised a few notches. But who knows what the thinking was in these casting decisions (other than, perhaps, the economic expediency of a small cast in a 78-seater).
After a brief delay due to Bradley’s death (which was, like Till’s, untimely) the Fountain Theatre presented the West Coast premiere of The Ballad of Emmett Till in February during Black History Month; however, the Thursday night performance I went to was sold out, and as of press time it has already been extended twice, through April. But in a country still troubled by racism, where hate crimes are on the rise -- from nooses and KKK hoods at UCSD to death threats against the first African American president -- any month is appropriate for this engaging interpretation of the life and death of Emmett Till, the martyr who launched the Civil Rights movement. As a historical footnote: three months after Till’s murder, Rosa Parks stood up by sitting down in a segregated Southern bus.
The Ballad of Emmett Till is being performed through April 25 at the Fountain Theatre, 5060 Fountain Ave., Los Angeles CA 90029, on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 p.m.; Sundays at 2:00 p.m. For more info: (323)663-1525 or www.FountainTheatre.com.
