The international project has explored the black diaspora’s experiences in some of the largest multicultural cities in the world, Chicago, Minneapolis, Cleveland, Baltimore and London.
The Bush contributes four new commissions by black British writers Rachel De-Lahay, Winsome Pinnock, Somalia Seaton and Mojisola Adebayo, to the Black Lives, Black Words canon. The programme will also include previously performed pieces by American writers Idris Goodwin and Harrison David Rivers.
All six plays will be performed alongside spoken word interludes each night. These are Womb (Somalia Seaton), #Matter (Idris Goodwin), This Bitter Earth (Harrison David Rivers), The Principles of Cartography (Winsome Pinnock), My White Best Friend (Rachel De-Lahay) and The Interrogation of Sandra Bland (Mojisola Adebayo). Poet Anthony Anaxagorou will perform his poems If I Told You and Master’s Revenge.
The plays will be performed by actors and in the spirit of protest, most of the audience will stand and move with the performance.
Find out more about the programme on our blog.
Black Lives, Black Words was initiated by the award-winning American playwright Reginald Edmund, who produced the USA premiere at the Greenhouse Theatre in Chicago in July 2015. The Bush Theatre presented its UK Premiere in Oct 2015 produced by Artistic Directors of the Future.
