Negro Digest - Freedom Archives

the members of Miss Brooks' workshop
ended up as "winners .'' The
famed poet presented the young
writers with copies of two very popular
books by black authors, John
A . Williams' novel, Tl7e Mun Who
Cried I Am, and Harald Cruses
analysis of the black intellectual
On Stage : The year got off to an
auspicious start with the opening in
New York of the Negro Ensemble
Company's production of Peter
Weiss' Song of the husitanian Bogey,
which is mentioned elsewhere in
these pages . . . A one-act play by
Wilmer Lucas, Patent Leather Sunday,
was scheduled for production
in Seattle, Wash ., in February and
March . . . A one-act play by Charles
Self, of Kenner, La ., was produced
by the Free Southern Theater during
the February Festival of Afro-
American Arts at llillard University
. . Rob Curry performed the
featured role of Randall, the mesmerizing
murderer, in the Parkway
Theater's production of William
Hanley's Slow Dance on the killing
Ground in Chicago . The Parkway
Theater is one of the branches (the
South Side on'e) of the city's famed
Hull House . . During "Soul
Week," the Festival of Black Art
produced at Lake Forest College
by the college's black students in
January, a student production of
.lean Genet's The Blacks was featured
. There are only 60 black students
among the 1,250 students at
the college on Chicago's rich North
Shore . . . Sidney Poiticr's debut as
NEGRO DIGEST Mo"ch 1968
(Continued from pine ,iQ)
scene . The Crisis of the Negro intellectual
.
Meanwhile, Miss Brooks was appointed
poet laureate of Illinois by
Gov . Otto Kerner, as a highlight of
the state's sesqui-centennial celebration
. The previous poet laureate of
the state was Carl Sandburg .
director of Carrv Me Back To
Morrzingside Heights came after
N~cxo DIGfiST had gone to press.
Whether or not the show was a success
should be general news by the
time this is published . Louis Gossett
and Cicely Tyson have featured
roles in the play . . As a member
of the Lincoln Center Repertory
Theater, Diana Sands has a role in
the Center's production of Tiger At
The Gates . Miss Sands' stint as St .
Town brought her mixed notices . . .
The play, The Great White Hope,
will undergo extensive cuts before it
opens on Broadway in the fall . James
Earl Jones, who portrayed the Jack
Jefferson (read Jack Johnson) role
in the Washington, D . C., production
(at the Arena Theater), will star in
the Broadway production . . Josephine
(Baker) the Great laid the
groundwork for a series of spring appearances
during her February visit
to the United States . . . The February
fire that gutted the New Lafayette
Theater in Harlem ended-at
least temporarily-another dream.
Because of financial difficulties, the
directors had postponed the production
of Ed Bullins' In The Wine
Time . Now the future of the theater
is uncertain .
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