Though progress has been made regarding racial representation onstage in Atlanta, efforts should continue and expand until Atlanta theater better reflects the city’s population in its shows and staffs. And plays created by writers of color, and brought to life by a diverse group of artists onstage and backstage, should become the rule at professional theaters, not the exception. Those were key points made during a a July 7 panel discussion titled The Movement Lives On: Black Lives Matter and Atlanta Theatre, organized by Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre Company.
“Theater doesn’t happen in a vacuum,” moderator Kelundra Smith, a playwright and ArtsATL editor-at-large, noted at the start of the Community Conversation event held at Southwest Arts Center. “It is often mirroring to us what is happening in the world.”
Beginning in 2020 around the time of the Covid-19 outbreak and the death of George Floyd, many metro theaters issued statements in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement. Racial reckoning gatherings that occurred in the Atlanta theater community then addressed how the casts and creators of recently produced professional shows didn’t reflect the city’s diverse population — by a sizable margin. People of color made up 54 percent of Atlanta, yet only 12 percent of the produced plays were by BIPOC writers, according to figures shared at one of the reckoning events in 2020.
As reported by The New York Times, of the 187 productions staged in the city in 2019, only 22 were by playwrights of color. In the 2021-22 season, that number doubled, Smith said, citing research from True Colors. Additionally, according to the Lilly Awards, which honor women in theater, only 10 percent of plays produced in the South were written by women, though women comprise 70 percent of the theatergoing audience nationwide.
The panelists taking part in the discussion were activists and performers Brittani Minnieweather, Lilliangina Quiñones, Amee Vyas and ArtsATL editor-at-large Jim Farmer, who also runs Out on Film, Atlanta’s LGBTQ film festival. The event was attended by an audience of about 50, including several local theater company leaders.
The evening featured scenes from Fannie: The Music and Life of Fannie Lou Hamer.
Citing Hamer’s famous quote, “Until I am free, you are not free either,” Smith asked the panel about how they felt about the current struggles for equality in the nation and what that means for Atlanta theater.
“In our nation, [equality] feels far, so I would like for theater to be a respite,” Quiñones said. “I would love for theater to be a soft place to land. I would love for us, as artists, creators and leaders of color, to be able to take off our armor. Because if we can’t do it inside of these walls, then what are we doing here? What are we here for?”
Minnieweather, also a playwright and co-founder of Black Leaders Advocating Cultural Theatre (B.L.A.C.T.), said pandemic-caused work stoppage forced theaters, notably including Serenbe Playhouse, to address the large problems of racial inequity, which had been regarded as an “open secret” before.
“There were actors and artists who were concerned and wanted to speak out about Serenbe,” she said. “But people were not comfortable losing their jobs. In my opinion, it took a stoppage of work for the open secret to become completely open.”
The issues at Serenbe, which were covered extensively by Farmer after the resignation of artistic director Brian Clowdus, led to its closure. But Serenbe is not the only theater where inequity was an issue.
Since theaters have reopened, panelists said they have seen a difference in diverse representation onstage.
“Yes, we have seen a difference,” Minnieweather said. “No, it is not enough.”
“We’re not blind, and we are paying attention,” Quiñones said. “We see the cast announcements. We see the season announcements. We see the new people that are staffed in your offices. We see all of it.”
For the most part, local theaters are still operating in survival mode, producing what is safe and what they know is going to sell tickets to the same patrons they had before the pandemic, she said.
“To them, we’re a risk,” Quiñones said. “When I see the same old-same old, I see that they’re not willing to take that risk. If you’re not willing to take that risk, you’re automatically closing the door.”
Farmer said that even theaters that expressed a commitment to change are still producing few plays by Black playwrights. He said he has also witnessed big theaters present problematic work with stereotypical and offensive gay characters.
“I’ve seen some gradual changes,” he said. “For all the positives I see, I see some negatives, though. A couple days ago, I got a press release from a theater company that made a statement, and they basically have one Black show in their season, and they’re patting themselves on the back.”
Vyas, the co-founder of East by Southeast, which promotes work by American artists of Asian descent, said theaters that diversified their staffs, often with newly hired community development liaisons, are not including those people in artistic decision-making.
“The people making the decisions are not diverse at the end of the day,” she said. “But I’m going to give these theaters two or three years to make it happen. Having more conversations like this will help us keep them accountable.”
The community outreach jobs are often quickly vacated, Minnieweather said.
“If you don’t change the water, you’re still going to get the same result,” Quiñones said. “Structurally, systematically, at a deep institutional level, these organizations have to be willing to completely deconstruct and rebuild. If that doesn’t happen, the revolving door will still be there.”
Quiñones said that her work as an educator is also a way she strives to implement systemic change, for she wants young artists to enter theaters in the future with different standards of what diversity is acceptable.
Minnieweather said diverse teams of creators should be allowed the reins of shows more often in the future. Quiñones agreed, adding that all shows — even “classics” — should have diverse casting because voices matter.
Vyas said, additionally, that ideal Atlanta theaters would pay artists a living wage and tell a wide range of diverse stories while remaining true to their missions.
“I don’t want all theater to look the same,” she said. “Every theater needs to have their own creative voice. But within that, there should be diversity. The American story is a diverse story, and I want to see that.”
The panel was presented by Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre Company in partnership with ArtsATL and TYDEF Studios.
“We’re here because Atlanta can change,” Vyas said. “The theater community is small enough that we can affect some change. Even as we get bigger, we still retain that sense that Atlanta is the biggest small town you’ll ever be in. I love it because I feel I can effect change, and I feel like my voice is being heard. And that is true for anyone starting out. We want to hear your voice.”
Questions from the audience included one from opera singer and activist Jayme Alilaw, who said she worked with Clowdus at Serenbe at one point.
“How do we maintain the solidarity now that people are getting work again?” she asked. “How do we keep people plugged in, energized, willing to require systemic change, rather than putting a bunch of Black people on a flyer or program and saying, ‘We’ve changed!’ even when the turnover remains the same.”
The panel said the change can sustain through open, transparent discussions of money, including salaries. Also, empowering the next generation will force systemic change. And artists should choose work that is challenging and artistically fulfilling as we move forward, the panelists said.
Concluding the event, Smith said she was grateful for the Community Conversation and hopeful for Atlanta’s continued progress.
“We still have a way to go because it was abysmal before,” Smith said. “But we are seeing more plays by women, more plays by people of color. To me, we’ll be in a decent place when the numbers quadruple. We’ll be in an ideal place when we’re looking at merit and not having to put people in the boxes where we think they belong at all.”
::
Benjamin Carr, a member of the American Theatre Critics Association, is an arts journalist and critic who has contributed to ArtsATL since 2019. His plays have been produced at The Vineyard Theatre in Manhattan, as part of the Samuel French Off-Off Broadway Short Play Festival, and the Center for Puppetry Arts. His novel Impacted was published by The Story Plant in 2021.
