This play is meant to inspire and to educate. It is also meant to provoke the audience into a recognition of the depth and breadth of systemic racism. Richard Wright, the author of the novel Native Son and the autobiography Black Boy, pioneered an influential school of protest literature. He became the first Black writer to pen a bestseller that overtly criticized racism and white supremacy. Following his success, Wright grew disillusioned with the United States, and, in 1947, relocated to France. Before his death in 1960, at age 52, he coined the phrase “Black Power” in support of African anti-colonial revolutions.
In this dramatic reenactment, Richard Wright talks about racism, poverty, civil rights, American imperialism, and a visionary post-colonial future — topics important then and now.