Mosaic Theatre’s production Native Son, a play based on Richard Wright’s 1940 novel of the same name, is opening at the Atlas Performing Arts Center on March 27 and will run through April 28.
Touching on the subjects of racial prejudice and freedom, the play follows an African-American man who works in the house of a wealthy white man. The story was adapted for stage by Chicago’s Nambi E. Kelley.
The ground-breaking adaptation brings to stage Wright’s iconic novel about oppression, freedom, and justice. “Suffocating in rat-infested poverty on the South Side of Chicago in the 1930s, 20-year-old Bigger Thomas struggles to find a place for himself in a world whose prejudice has shut him out. After taking a job in a wealthy white man’s house, Bigger unwittingly unleashes a series of events that violently and irrevocably seal his fate,” notes the play brief.
Directed by award-winning playwright Psalmayene 24, the play features Clayton Pelham Jr. as Bigger Thomas, accompanied by Lolita Marie, Melissa Flaim, Drew Kopas, Vaughn Midder, Tendo Nsubuga, Madeline Joey Rose, Stephen Schmidt, and Renee Elizabeth Wilson.
Psalmayene 24 told the D.C. Theatre Scene that Native Son was about the humanity of black people, something that is being lost in the conversation. “The ugly truth of the matter is, we are still being dehumanized, criminalized and vilified. It’s really about illuminating black people’s humanity through Bigger Thomas, who has the weight of oppression on his shoulders,” he said.
“A bold new tone…distills Wright’s novel into 90 intermission-less minutes that are all action. It appreciates Wright’s book for its intensity, refusing to slow down,” Hartford Courant, the largest daily newspaper in Connecticut, wrote about the play.
Tickets are available for $10 – $65 and can be bought here.