Wanda's Picks

Rebroadcast of interview with MARGO HALL, from July 26, 2010 re: Aurora Theatre Company's 19th season opening play, Thursday-Friday, AUG 26-27, through SEPT 26, 2010, Alice Childress’s vibrant, humorous, and heartbreaking look at racism through the lens of the theater, TROUBLE IN MIND. Set during the early years of the Civil Rights movement, this disconcerting yet disarmingly funny look at the inequalities of American life in the 1950’s highlights the half-truths we tell ourselves about race relations and societal progress in America. First produced in 1955, TROUBLE IN MIND follows a cast of black and white actors attempting to mount a production of a “progressive” new play. The play-within-the-play, entitled Chaos in Belleville, an anti-lynching drama set in the South, written by a white writer and directed by a white director, marks the first opportunity for Wiletta Mayer, a gifted African American actress, to play a leading lady on Broadway. But what compromises must she make to succeed? Robin Stanton (Speech & Debate, Betrayed, Permanent Collection) directs this play about race, identity, and opportunity, featuring Bay Area favorite Margo Hall in her Aurora Theatre Company debut. We close with another rebroadcast. This from AUG 20, where we open with the Dreams, as in DREAM GIRLS which also opens tonight in San Francisco, at the Curran Theatre. We also speak to Friends of the Negro Spirituals awardees this year, get an update on the Oscar Grant case and hear about a fundraiser last week, AUG 20 and other upcoming events from Oscar's Uncle Bobby. We close with John Santos, who shares a new musical project which debuts part 1 AUG 21-22 weekend.