"Working Things Out" by Mwalim to be presented at the 2005 National Black Theatre Festival
July 2, 2005 (Press Release) --
NEW BEDFORD July 2, 2005 -- “Working Things Out,” subtitled a comedy about a tragic relationship, is a one-act play that will be presented at this years National Black Theater Festival in Winston-Salem North Carolina, running August 2nd to the 4th at 3 and 8 p.m. in the Marriot Ballroom.
The playwright is Black Wampanoag performing artist, writer and filmmaker Mwalim (Morgan James Peters, I). Cilla Albee directs the play. “Working Things Out” marks the first time that a play from a southeastern Massachusetts dramatist has been selected by the festival for presentation.
The National Black Theater Festival is a bi-annual event that began in 1989 by North Carolina Black Repertory Company’s Artistic Director Larry Leon Hamlin. The festival attracts an international array of Black celebrities and professionals from the theater, film and television industries as attendees and participants.
“Working Things Out” depicts the rise and ride of a relationship between Oliver, a young Black poet and academic, and Janet, an aspiring poet and computer trainer; from meeting, to dating, to the world of boyfriend and girlfriend.
A version of the play, directed by Kimberly Vasquez, premiered in June of 2003 in New York City at the New Scroll Bearer’s Drama Festival as a staged reading. It subsequently was produced for the Downtown Urban Drama Festival, also in New York City in May of 2004 as well as a part of the “As Told On The Corner” drama installation by New African Company in Boston at the Museum of the National Center for African American Art in December of 2004. This installation featured a combination of short plays by Mwalim and John Adekoje and was directed by Vincent Siders.
The upcoming production of the show at the festival was developed through New African Company, Boston’s oldest professional Black theater company, where Mwalim is a playwright-in-residence; and the New Diaspora Drama Lab at UMass Dartmouth, a playwright’s workshop under the auspices of the African/African American Studies Program at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, formed in 2004 by Mwalim & Professor Emeritus James Nee.
Mwalim is considered by critics and peers alike to be one of the true modern masters of the oral tradition, Mwalim is a multifaceted performing artist, writer, filmmaker and educator. Mwalim (aka Morgan James Peters) grew up immersed in the oral traditions of Bajan (Barbados) and Wampanoag culture. He is a keeper of both the New World Griot and Medicine Trickster traditions. Currently, Mwalim is a full-time professor of English and African/African American Studies at UMass Dartmouth. He holds a BA in Music and a MS in Film from Boston University and is currently completing his MFA in Playwriting at Goddard College where he studies with the award-winning dramatist, Leslie Lee.
For more information, contact the National Black Theatre Festival at (336) 723-2266 or vist them on the web at www.nbtf.org
The playwright is Black Wampanoag performing artist, writer and filmmaker Mwalim (Morgan James Peters, I). Cilla Albee directs the play. “Working Things Out” marks the first time that a play from a southeastern Massachusetts dramatist has been selected by the festival for presentation.
The National Black Theater Festival is a bi-annual event that began in 1989 by North Carolina Black Repertory Company’s Artistic Director Larry Leon Hamlin. The festival attracts an international array of Black celebrities and professionals from the theater, film and television industries as attendees and participants.
“Working Things Out” depicts the rise and ride of a relationship between Oliver, a young Black poet and academic, and Janet, an aspiring poet and computer trainer; from meeting, to dating, to the world of boyfriend and girlfriend.
A version of the play, directed by Kimberly Vasquez, premiered in June of 2003 in New York City at the New Scroll Bearer’s Drama Festival as a staged reading. It subsequently was produced for the Downtown Urban Drama Festival, also in New York City in May of 2004 as well as a part of the “As Told On The Corner” drama installation by New African Company in Boston at the Museum of the National Center for African American Art in December of 2004. This installation featured a combination of short plays by Mwalim and John Adekoje and was directed by Vincent Siders.
The upcoming production of the show at the festival was developed through New African Company, Boston’s oldest professional Black theater company, where Mwalim is a playwright-in-residence; and the New Diaspora Drama Lab at UMass Dartmouth, a playwright’s workshop under the auspices of the African/African American Studies Program at the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth, formed in 2004 by Mwalim & Professor Emeritus James Nee.
Mwalim is considered by critics and peers alike to be one of the true modern masters of the oral tradition, Mwalim is a multifaceted performing artist, writer, filmmaker and educator. Mwalim (aka Morgan James Peters) grew up immersed in the oral traditions of Bajan (Barbados) and Wampanoag culture. He is a keeper of both the New World Griot and Medicine Trickster traditions. Currently, Mwalim is a full-time professor of English and African/African American Studies at UMass Dartmouth. He holds a BA in Music and a MS in Film from Boston University and is currently completing his MFA in Playwriting at Goddard College where he studies with the award-winning dramatist, Leslie Lee.
For more information, contact the National Black Theatre Festival at (336) 723-2266 or vist them on the web at www.nbtf.org
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