A Word With the Emperor
Robey Theatre Production Kicks Off LATC Spring Season
by Ryan Vaillancourt
Published: Friday, March 26, 2010 4:42 PM PDT
DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES – The central conflict in the Robey Theatre Company’s The Emperor’s Last Performance revolves around a racial slur, a word whose use is as controversial now as it was during the 1920s, when the world premiere is set.
Against the backdrop of the Harlem Renaissance, the play centers on African-American actor Charles Gilpin and his personal battle with the n-word.
“Some things never change,” said Ben Guillory, artistic director and co-founder of the Robey Theatre Company, a resident company of the Historic Core’s Los Angeles Theater Center for the past three years.
Guillory, who also directs The Emperor’s Last Performance, knows that the play is first and foremost a period piece that strives to be true to a cast of real life characters, from Gilpin to playwright Eugene O’Neill to Paul Robeson, the luminary for whom the Robey is named. But if the cultural references in Melvin Ismael Johnson’s script reflect 1920s New York, some of its themes are just as relevant in 2010 Los Angeles.
“In the context of the play, that word and the use of it and who should use it if anyone, and who shouldn’t, is discussed in depth,” Guillory said.
The play chronicles Gilpin’s role as Brutus Jones in O’Neill’s play The Emperor Jones. In O’Neill’s work, Gilpin is sent to jail after killing another man in a fight. He later escapes from prison and moves to a tropical island, where he cons the locals into making him the emperor, though he must flee when the natives rebel.
Johnson’s piece, however, focuses on the relationship between Gilpin and the white playwright O’Neill, who wrote the racial slur intoThe Emperor Jones more than 30 times.
“These days O’Neill would have been considered a racist, but back then, he was doing courageous work,” said Guillory.
Ultimately, the Robey production deals with Gilpin’s objection to using the slur in the performance, and the consequences he faces for challenging O’Neill.
“The motives are suspect as to why it’s used so often when it’s written by a white man, and Charles challenges that,” Guillory said. “Then there are questions about the way he challenges.”
Earning the Stage
The Robey Theatre Company’s residency at the LATC coincides with its playwrights program. The effort is helping 18 writers develop works for the stage.
The Emperor’s Last Performance is one of three Robey productions scheduled for 2010 at the LATC. All are products of the playwrights program, Guillory said.
Founded by Guillory and actor Danny Glover 16 years ago, the Robey Theatre Company’s mission is to produce works that deal with the African American and black experience worldwide.
“This playwrights’ process is really about developing new work that deserves production, so the fact that we’re doing three world premieres this year, it’s because the work that’s coming out of the program is just deserving of production,” he said.
The Emperor’s Last Performance runs Fridays at 8 p.m., Saturdays at 3 and 8 p.m. and Sundays at 3 and 7 p.m. It runs through April 4 at the LATC, 514 S. Spring St., thelatc.org. Ticket information at (213) 489-0994, ext. 107, or robeytheatrecompany.com.
Spring Season
The Emperor’s Last Performance kicks off the spring season at the LATC. The series of plays running at the venue’s four theaters has been dubbed “East of Broadway,” for its location a block east of L.A.’s own Broadway. On the docket are:
April 16-May 16: In Erik Patterson’s Sick, Pamela keeps digging herself deeper into a world of hypochondria.
May 1-30: In Dementia, a production of the resident Latino Theater Company, Moe has a going away party because he’s dying of AIDS.
May 7-June 6: 1951-2006 is a 50-year love story centered on the fourth floor of a brownstone on the east side of Manhattan.
June 18-27: The Robey Theatre Company returns with Transitions, written by Kellie Roberts. The three short plays deal with ordinary people struggling with a call from God.
June 19: The Slumber of Reason is a new dance theater piece developed and produced by the Latina Dance Project. It springboards off prints by Francisco de Goya.
