Theater

A Welders Check-In with Fellow Welders Playwright Jared Shamberger

Last week, Welders Jared Shamberger I went live on Facebook for a conversation about how this year has influenced their upcoming stories in 2021, The B Word and Girls’ Night (with Spirits), and how we envision the production process next year.

One thing is for sure, this year has affected not only the status of my creative project with The Welders, but also how I see the story of my play Girls’ Night (with Spirits) unfold with themes unique to how I’ve dealt with 2020 emotionally.

Watch our conversation below!

Welders 3.0 playwrights Jared Shamberger and Teshonne Powell went LIVE on Facebook for a brief chat about their plans, revelations, and intentions for their ...

FRESHH Forever

This summer, FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company had closed. Not quite like a door shutting, but more like a flower folding its petals toward the center at night time. The sun had set, and a new phase was just set to begin. I had begun working with FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company back when it was FRESHH Inc. in 2015 when its most central focus was as a performing arts and mentorship program for school-aged Black girls. I can’t recall exactly how I first met Goldie Patrick, FRESHH’s Founding Executive Director, but it was at the Atlas Performing Arts Center for some type of show for the Atlas Intersections Festival. I remember walking up to her and introducing myself, enthusiastically. Something along the lines of…

Hi, my name is Teshonne! I loved your show! I’m new to DC and just getting started in my artistry. Is there anyway I can be involved in any capacity with your work with FRESHH?

Ha! And Goldie must have replied very pleasantly, matching my enthusiasm with… yes! Absolutely! I felt proud of myself at that moment because I had done something that I’m historically horrible at: networking. And if I did come across as awkward and weird, Goldie didn’t let me know it. :) I didn’t know what I expected after that interaction. But, I remember being thrilled and pleasantly surprised when she reached out to me to participate in her play, Surrender.

Since that time, I worked with FRESHH as a performer, a playwright, a communications professional, an educator, a director, and a program manager. It was FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company that professionally produced my very first play, Afromemory. It was FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company that produced my work at the Kennedy Center. It was FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company that allowed me to lead a writing circle of Black women interested in playwriting. And through FRESHH, I have met so many talented Black women artists along the way. FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company gave me a chance to try out my art. As a Black woman writer in DC, I often felt lost as to how I was supposed to get my work out there. How was I supposed to deepen my connections and experience in a predominantly White, male theatre economy? FRESHH said to me (in Goldie’s voice):

Don’t trip. We got you. We’ll hold you up. We’ll lift each other up. This is a safe space to create, to grow, to mess up, and to triumph.

As FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company comes to a close in 2020, I’m reflecting on what I will take with me from what I’ve learned and experienced there. I’m thinking of how I can pass on to others what FRESHH has passed on to me: professional perseverance, artistic confidence, a love for community, a love for Black people, and a passion for Black women stories, all of them.

Thank you, Goldie, for giving me a chance. Thank you for your hard work, your mentorship, and your creative and bold spirit.

-T

I'm a producing playwright with The Welders. I’ll explain.

The original Welders, along with Welders 2.0 and 3.0, looking sharp (Photo courtesy of Manaf Azzam )

The original Welders, along with Welders 2.0 and 3.0, looking sharp (Photo courtesy of Manaf Azzam )

Imagine if opportunity was like a banana peel that you tripped and fell over on your way to work. You’re on the ground and look around disoriented, but then you find a $20 bill lying on the ground next to you.

I was just sitting here, living my life. I had only just begun to see myself playwriting. I was working strictly on creative fiction, and through my work and growth with FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company, I ended up writing and having my work produced on stage. Like, actors and errthang! The feeling of seeing people spit out my words and give them life was absolutely amazing and addicting. I knew that I wanted to do more of that. Although at the time, I hadn’t given it serious thought as to how.

I had heard of The Welders before and even crossed paths in a “six degrees of separation” sort of way. The Welders is a collective of playwrights that support each other and help each other get there plays fully produced. A few years ago, this group of playwrights, after successful seasons of original work in the DC area, sought to pass on the organization in its entirety (funds, resources, board of directors, and all) to another group of emerging playwrights so that they may do the same. Welders 2.0, as they are dubbed, had begun the process of passing on the organization to another group of playwrights and theatre artists. This new group would be Welders 3.0.

The application process for Welders 3.0 had opened right around the time when I had just gotten comfortable with identifying myself as a writer. As in, when someone asks you what you do, I just learned to stop saying, “I write,” and start saying, “I’m a writer.” When I was approached by a person gathering a group of writers to apply for The Welders, I decided that this was a chance to truly take my artistry seriously.

My cohort: Jared Shamberger, JR “Nexus” Russ, Sisi Reid, myself, Farah Lawal Harris, and Cat Frost

My cohort: Jared Shamberger, JR “Nexus” Russ, Sisi Reid, myself, Farah Lawal Harris, and Cat Frost

A couple of months later, I ended up joining a group of theatre artists whose work I enjoyed and whom I respected. I knew—as we were discussing our projects— should our application to lead The Welders be accepted, that I’d not only support and advocate for their projects wholeheartedly, but that each of them had something that I could learn to grow as a playwright and as a member of the DC arts community.

We applied.

We were accepted.

(See! Banana peel with a $20 bill!)

We vow to produce work that centers the spectrum of Black identities. We vow to produce work that strengthens the Black creative economy in DC. We vow to create opportunities to gather, discuss and process issues that matter to Black people. We promise to bring excellent stories to the stage that everyone will enjoy.

As Welders 3.0, we’ll officially start producing our work in January 2020. I’m so excited to learn. I’m gonna learn so hard, y’all! I’m going to strengthen my writing, grow in confidence as an artist and writer, and take these skills and opportunities and pass them on to folks from marginalized communities that could use them to thrive. What an honor.

Learn more about The Welders HERE, learn about Welders 3.0 HERE, and make a donation for the cause HERE!

-BAB

Afromemory goes to the Kennedy Center!

Labor Day weekend was super busy and super magical! I was once again commissioned by FRESHH Incorporated Theatre Company to expand Afromemory into a 60 minute one-act play to be performed in a staged reading at the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. I was tasked with hiring a cast of actors and director to bring the play to life. What I decided to do was show a little more of how the protagonist Sarah B. got to the point she was at in the 10-minute play that was produced last Spring. I was thrilled to find so many people, from the audience members to the actors, so enthusiastic about the story I tried to tell!

Actors Lori Pitts, Tara Reeves, and myself after the show

Actors Lori Pitts, Tara Reeves, and myself after the show

Below is just a snippet of the 20-minute post-show discussion facilitated by FRESHH Inc. Theatre team member Fatima Quander that followed the staged reading of Afromemory. Thank you to the director Angelisa Gilyard for your thoughtful and explorative direction. Thank you to the cast Bryanda Minix, Karen Elle, Jonathan Miot, Tara Yates, Lori Pitts, and the lovely, young and talented Kayla Earl for your talent and commitment to bringing my play to life! And thank you especially to FRESHH Inc. Theatre for providing me with yet another platform to share my work!

Reflections on the Next to Kin One-Act Festival

Back in April 2018, something magical happened. I was commissioned to write a short play in tribute to one of my favorite writers of all time.

I was first introduced to Octavia Butler in college. Hungering for stories that centered folks who looked like me, that went to places and themes that I never considered in other works of fantasy and science fiction, I stumbled upon Dawn, Butler’s first novel in the Xenogenesis series. Years later, I strive to write stories just as insanely brilliant as Octavia Butler’s stories. Year later, FRESHH Inc. Theatre Company says, “Hey, we want to do a festival paying tribute to the legacy of Octavia Butler.” Years late, out of my head pops Afromemory.

Afromemory was about a woman with brown skin going through the future’s version of a quarter-life crisis. On top of the literal pressures of dating and marrying, she experiences a crisis of identity in a world that does not acknowledge race or ethnic culture, having scapegoated such constructs for violence, and political dissent in the world’s past. She begins a journey through her ancestral past that will change her life and endanger it forever.

This was my first time having something I wrote produced for the stage. I was honored to be among six playwrights: Nina Anglea Mercer, Adanna Paul, Maryam Foye, Heather Gibson, and Ebony Rosemond, who all shared a love for what Octavia Butler stood for…

…placing black women in the future, front and center.

Thank you to Goldie Patrick, founder and executive director of FRESHH Inc. Theatre for this opportunity, to Ayesis Clay who directed my play brilliantly and to Lori Pitts (Sarah S) and Tara Yates (Sarah B) who brought my play and its characters to life on stage.

You can learn more about what FRESHH Inc. Theater has in store HERE.