Director’s Race Adds to Drama for an August Wilson Revival
This article is about the revival of one of August Wilson’s plays, “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone,” and how it is being directed by a white director, the Tony-award-winning Bartlett Sher, for the first time. The article explains how an unwritten rule about Wilson’s plays was that a white director could not direct them. This is because Wilson felt that a white person could not empathize with the characters in the play nearly as well as a black person could, and because the opportunities for a black person to direct are few and far between, and so it is helpful to the few black directors out there to have plays that only they could direct. However, Bartlett Sher is a phenomenal director, winning his Tony for “South Pacific.” Also, Wilson’s widow approved him as the director. There are many people, specifically black directors, who are outraged by this, and who want Mr. Sher not to be involved at all. This is where the racism factor comes into play, because the reason that the black directors are outraged is that they believe that the fact that a white man is directing the play is not only a lost opportunity for them, but also reflects a double standard due to the fact that almost no black directors are chosen to direct plays written by white people.
Obviously August Wilson’s plays are about the life of black people in the time that he has them take place. Therefore, is it inappropriate to have a white director for these plays? Also, was this decision a consciously racist one?
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/23/theater/23wils.html?_r=1&hp
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