American Moor by Keith Hamilton Cobb

My beloved took me to see American Moor Sunday at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse.  It was such a powerful piece of theatre. My normal readership will have to indulge me, as it is unlikely that either of you have seen it yet. I want to write about it, but I can't explain it. This is really one of those you-had-to-be-there things. So instead of trying to describe it, I am going to pretend  I'm writing to Keith Hamilton Cobb.

I hope that moment, when you were shouting to us, 'Do you see me? ... Do you see me?' never fades from my memory. It was all I could do to not tell you that I did. I did see you, and your beautiful, ugly, ever-changing, self-contradictory humanity, on display before us. Your writing and performance really seized me. I almost forgot it I was in a theatre. It was like I had a glimpse of your soul, and what our culture has done to it.

As soon as it was over, my first thought was: everyone needs to see this play. Only seconds passed before my thought was proven so utterly wrong, as I overheard a pensioner woman nearby explaining to someone else that maybe the director did not hire him because he was not a good actor. Wow, really? That is what you took away from watching incredibly vulnerable and remarkably nuanced inner thoughts about what it is like to experience racial prejudice? Really? Now, I understand why Reni Eddo-Lodge is no longer speaking to me about race.

And then, there was the 'question and answer' after the performance. I loved how you dangled the conversation around the edges of racial rabbit holes. It was just so great to hear honest and thoughtful conversation that approaches these issues in a communal space that actually hints at the depth of what we never talk about in the open. Just the possibility that we might one day go down one of those rabbit holes together is just... well, it is evolution, revolution, and epiphany all rolled up into one.

In the Q&A, I also learned that there is a version of the play where the director is a disembodied voice. That sounds like a real inside-your-head experience. I am not one to go to shows again but if I can see American Moor again with a disembodied director, I will be there. Profound stuff.

Photo Credits

Poster: American Moor