EDUCATOR’S SHOW GUIDE

General Info

DEAR EDUCATORS,

Wayne State University is proud to produce plays for young people’s enjoyment and to actively explore the beauty, diversity, complexity and challenges of the world around them through the dramatic arts. We wish to support the development of their creative voice, imagination, and understanding of drama and its role in our global society.

This play guide is designed to be a tool in helping you prepare your students for our performance as well as extend the production experience back into the classroom.

Activities presented assist in achieving the Michigan Common Core State Standards (MI-CCSS).

Your comments and suggestions about this guide, presentation and/or programming are greatly appreciated.

YOUR STUDENT’S ROLE

You may wish to have a discussion with your students before attending the play. Remind your students that they have an important role to play at the performance being the audience. It is because of the audience that the theatre exists. It will be their energy and response that will directly affect the actors onstage. Young audiences should be reminded that live theatre is not like watching TV, a movie or DVD; the actors cannot pause or be rewound, there are no commercial break for running to the bathroom, the volume cannot be turned up to hear better if someone other than the actors are talking.

Encourage your students to listen and watch the play. They can laugh and cheer for their favorite characters. At the end of the play, applause is appropriate and is the opportunity for your students to thank the actors while the actors are thanking you for the role you played as the audience.

ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT

George C. Wolfe was born in Frankfort, Kentucky. He attended an all-black public school (a Rosenwald school) where his mother taught. After a family move, he began attending the integrated Frankfort public school district. At Frankfort High School he began to pursue his interest in the theatre arts, and wrote poetry and prose for the school’s literary journal. After high school, Wolfe enrolled at the historically black Kentucky State University, the alma mater of his parents. After his first year, he transferred to Pomona College in Claremont, California where he pursued a BA in theater. Wolfe taught for several years in Los Angeles at the Inner City Cultural Center and later in New York City. He earned an MFA in dramatic writing and musical theater at New York University in 1983.

Wolfe has had a very diverse career. The Colored Museum was his breakthrough piece. He went on to write and direct a number of successful stage productions, including the 1991 musical Jelly’s Last Jam, which is a musical about the life of famous jazz musician Jelly Roll Morton. Jelly’s Last Jam ended up transferring to Broadway and received 11 Tony Award nominations. He also created the hit musical Bring in ‘Da Noise, Bring in ‘Da Funk, which also earned him a Tony award.

In 2004, after his successful career in theatre, Wolfe announced his intention to focus his efforts in film direction, beginning with the critically acclaimed HBO film Lackawanna Blues. He went on to continue to direct theatre and films, including the 2008 adaptation of Nicholas Sparks’ novel Nights in Rodanthe.

A theme in many of George C. Wolfe’s works relate to the African American experience, and as is especially prevelant in The Colored Museum, breaking those stereotypes. He has brought the stories of many African American people and artists to the forefront of American culture since the early 1980s, and fortunately he is still active today. In 2018, Wolfe will direct the Broadway revival of Eugene O’Neill’s The Iceman Cometh, with Denzel Washington playing the lead.

SYNOPSIS

The Colored Museum consists of 11 “exhibits” (scenes or sketches) that explore and satirize prominent themes, identities, and stereotypes found in African American culture. Each scene uses humor and satire to draw awareness and ultimately dismantle these stereotypes. Below you’ll find a brief summary of each of the 11 “exhibits.”

Git on Board: Miss Pat, a flight attendant, welcomes the audience aboard the fictional “Celebrity slaveship,” whose Savannah-bound journey from the Ivory Coast demands that passengers (audience) are to obey the “Fasten Shackles” sign and are not to rebel. The sketch explores and critiques the history of African Americans, from slavery to the regency of the basketball star.

Cooking’ with Aunt Ethel: Mammy Aunt Ethel host a cooking show in which she sings the recipe on how to “bake yourself a batch of Negros.”

The Photo Session: A glamorous black couple wearing “the best of everything and perfect smiles,” retreat from their past/history into a superficial world of narcissistic glamour. The Photo Session is Wolfe’s critique on the images and models of Ebony magazine.

Soldier with a Secret: In a monologue, deranged African American soldier sees his peer’s painful future and chooses to spare them the inevitable by killing them before they are forced to endure what their future holds.

The Gospel According to Miss Roj: Miss Roj, a transgender woman, “looks beneath the surface of her glittery nocturnal existence to find maggot-laced visions of ‘a whole race trashed and debased’ while in a homosexual nightclub.

The Hairpiece: A woman getting ready for a date is faced with an identity crisis when her two wigs, one a 1960s afro wig, the other a “long flowing wig,” come to life and “debate the ideological identity conflicts they represented in their owner’s life for 20 years.”

The Last Mama-on-the-Couch Play: Presented by a “Masterpiece Theater”-type announcer, this exhibit explores and satirizes Black drama formula used in theater and film. Some characters include a “well worn” mama on her “well worn” couch who fights with her son Walter-Lee-Beau-Willie-Jones whose “brow is heavy from three hundred years of oppression.” The Last Mama-on-the-Couch is Wolfe’s parody of A Raisin in the Sun and goes from overacted melodrama to an all-black Broadway musical number.

Things to Know - Ways to Grow Before and After the Show

SPEAKING AND LISTENING

[Sharing of any writing project orally in class will also fit under the Speaking and Listening (SL) Standard]

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.1.1, 2.1Participate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about grade level topics and txt with peers and adults in small and larger groups.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.1, 4.1, 5.1, 7.1, 8.1, [9-10.1, 11-12.1]Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in small groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade level topics and text, building on others; ideas and expressing their own clearly [and persuasively].

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.1.1, [2.4]Describe people, places, things and events with relevant details, expressing ideas and feelings clearly [audibly in coherent sentences].

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.3.4, [4.4, 5.4]Report on a topic or text, tell a story, or recount and experience with appropriate facts and relevant, descriptive details [to support main idea or theme] speaking clearly at an understandable pace.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.6.4, 7.4, 8.4Present claims and findings, emphasizing salient points in a focused, coherent manner with relevant evidence, sound valid reasoning, and well-chosen details: appropriate eye contact, adequate volume and clear pronunciation.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.9-10.4, 11-12.4Present information, findings, and supportive evidence, conveying a clear and distinct perspective, such that listeners can follow the line of reasoning, alternative or opposing perspectives are addressed, and the organization, development, substance, and style are appropriate to purpose, audience and range of formal and informal task.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.SL.6.6, 7.6, 8.6, 9-10.6, 11-12.6Adapt speech to a variety of context and task, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate.

Divide the class into two groups. Provide one question to each group to research/discuss/analyze. Have each group present their ideas/comments to the class for a group discussion/debate. a. What stereotypes affect you and or family? b. What stereotypes that you can think of do not affect you or your family?

Pre-Show Questions: 1. Have you ever been stereotyped? How did it make you feel? 2. Do you think watching a “vignette” play is different than watching a“plot-based” play? Why or why not? 3. How does your home community address diversity? 4. Have you ever found yourself (intentionally

SYNOPSIS (Continued)

Symbiosis: A man is confronted by his former childhood self while trying to throw away his past, “only to discover that his rebellious younger self refuses to be trashed without a fight.”

Lala’s Opening: Singer Lala Lamazing Grace is haunted by her former childhood self, an identity she thought she disposed of.

Permutations: A monologue in which Normal Jean, a young southern girl, explains to the audience how she laid a giant egg which is filled with babies.

The Party: Topsy Washington imagines a huge party in which “Nat Turner sips champagne out of Eartha Kitt’s slipper” and “Aunt Jemima and Angela Davis was in the kitchen sharing a plate of greens and just goin’ off about South Africa.” This exhibit merges the past and present to create Topsy’s fantasy party which defies logic and limitations.

READING: LITERATURE

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.1.9, 2.9, 3.9, (5.9, 6.9)Compare and contrast the adventures and experience of characters in stories. (in different forms or genres in terms of their approaches to similar themes and topics)

Many of the themes present in The Colored Museum include stereotypes, oppression, and identity. Have students select a theme and compare or contrast how they are presented in the play versus their experience with that issue in real life.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.6.7Compare and contrast the experience of reading a story, drama, or poem to listening to or viewing an audio, video, or live version of the text, including contrasting what they “see” and “hear” when reading the text to what the perceive when they listen or watch.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.7.7Compare and contrast a written story, drama or poem to its audio, film, staged or multimedia version, analyze the effects of techniques unique to each medium (e.g. lighting, sound, color, or camera focus and angles in a film).

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.8.7Analyze the extent to which a filmed or live production of a story or drama stays faithful to or departs from the text or script, evaluating the choices made by the director or actors.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.11-12.7Analyze multiple interpretations of a story, drama, or poem (e.g. recorded or live production of a play or recorded novel or poetry) evaluating how each version interprets the source text.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RL.(6.2) 7.2, 8.2, [9-10.2, 11-12.2]Determine (a theme) two or more themes or central ideas of a text and analyze their development over the course of the text, including its relationship to the characters, setting, and plot; [including how they interact and build on one another to produce a complex account: provide an objective summary of the text.]

The Colored Museum satirizes a number of well-known stories and works, including A Raisin in the Sun, cooking shows and Ebony Magazine. Provide your students with these examples, or let them choose other examples from the play, and have compare and contrast the original to the satire.

WRITING

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.6.1, 7.1, 8.1, [9-10.1, 11-12.1]Write arguments to support claims with clear reasons and relevant evidence. [Write an argument to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or text, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence.]

Write a review of the performance of The Colored Museum. What elements of the production (actors’ performances, set, props, costumes, lighting, sound, set, etc) were most and least effective in telling the story? Students should highlight scenes that made an impression, either positively or negatively. Provide evidence and details from your experience of watching the performance.

Read reviews from other sources and analyze them. How did they compare to your own review/opinion of the show. Do they agree or disagree with you? Students should evaluate their reviews for style and content. What changes would they make, if any, to their own writings after seeing these other reviews, and why?

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W. 6.3, 7.3, 8.3, 9-10.3, 11-12.3Writes narratives to develop real or imagined experiences or events using effective techniques, descriptive details, and clear event sequence.

Have students write their own “exhibit” to be added to The Colored Museum based on their own cultural experiences and identities.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.W.6.1, 7.1, 8.1, [9-10.1, 11-12.1]Write arguments to support claims with clear reasons and relevant evidence. [Write an argument to support claims in an analysis of substantive topics or text, using valid reasoning and relevant and sufficient evidence]

Give students examples of various stereotypes, either from the past or common now. Have students argue that those stereotypes either do or do not exist anymore based on research they’ve done. It could be set up as a debate where one group argues that the stereotype does still exist, and one group argues that it does not.

HISTORY/SOCIAL STUDIES

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.3Evaluate various explanation for actions or events and determine which explanation best accords with textural evidence acknowledging where the text leaves matters uncertain.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.6-8.6Identify aspects of a text that reveals an author’s point of view or purpose (e.g. loaded language, inclusion or avoidance of particular facts)

After telling students about George C. Wolfe’s background, engage them in a discussion about how his upbringing and education lead him to the creation of The Colored Museum.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.9-10.6Compare the point of view of two or more authors for how they treat the same or similar topics, including which details they include and emphasize in their respective accounts.

CCSS.ELA-LITERACY.RH.11-12.6Evaluate author’s differing points of views on the same historical events or issues by assessing the authors’ claims, reasoning and evidence.

Ask your students to share different portrayals of slavery and more modern African-American culture either as a class or in small groups. Then have them compare that to what they saw in The Colored Museum.

Post Show Questions

1. Did you find the play funny, or too serious? 2. Was there anything in the play that offended you? 3. Which “exhibit” could you most relate to, or stood out to you the most? 4. Do you think the play successfully challenged the stereotypes it sought to dismantle?

DIFFERENTIATED LEARNING ACTIVITIES(modify as needed to meet the needs of your students)

1. IdentityMany of the “exhibits” in The Colored Museum involve characters discussing their identities and other aspects of themselves through monologues. For this activity, have students fill in the following blanks. It could be poetic in nature or not. Have volunteers share with the class.

I am _____________________________________________________________________________________(student’s name)

I am _____________________________________________________________________________________

I wonder __________________________________________________________________________________

I hear ____________________________________________________________________________________

I see _____________________________________________________________________________________

I want ____________________________________________________________________________________

I am _____________________________________________________________________________________

I pretend __________________________________________________________________________________

I feel _____________________________________________________________________________________

I touch ____________________________________________________________________________________

I worry ____________________________________________________________________________________

I cry ______________________________________________________________________________________

I understand ________________________________________________________________________________

I say ______________________________________________________________________________________

I dream ____________________________________________________________________________________

I try _______________________________________________________________________________________

I hope _____________________________________________________________________________________

I am ______________________________________________________________________________________

2. Home CollageHave students bring pictures or other things that represent home to them. You could also provide magazines for students to cut images and words out of. Have the students create a collage together on a piece of poster board, so it represents all the different meanings of home found in your class. After, have students share what they chose to include in the collage, and encourage a discussion about how home can mean many different things to different people.

3. Picture MePrepare portraits/pictures of people or characters for each student. Separate the class into small groups. Pass out one picture per student. There should be enough room between group members so that they do not see each other’s picture or portrait. Have the students look at their picture silently for three (3) minutes. They need to study their picture so they can become that person. Have them decide on person-ality, mannerisms, age, voice, attitude, and other lifestyle choices of their character. After the three (3) minutes, have the students hand back their pictures. Inform students they are now at a “party” and they must transform into their character. They may only speak to other classmates as if they were their character. After about five (5) minutes, end the “party” and display the pictures at the front of the room. The class must now identify which student was portraying which picture. (Do not tell the class that the identification process will happen ahead of time. The temptation of “fooling” everyone is too great to resist for some people, and they will purposefully make their character unlike their picture).

After the activity, engage the class in a discussion to reflect on the following: a. How did it feel to be your character? b. Why did you make the personality and character choices that you did to portray that character? c. Did you meet people at the party of similar status? How did you know? Who was easier to talk to?

SPECIAL THANKSThank you to LaWanda Smith for her assistance in the development of this study guide.

THEATRE ETIQUETTE

The phrase “theatre etiquette” refers to the special rules of behavior that are called for when attending a theatre performance.

Above all, it is important to remember that the actors on stage can see and hear you at the same time you can see and hear them. Be respectful of the actors and your fellow audience members by being attentive and observing the general guidelines below:

Before you go:

• Please help us create a respectful environment for your fellow audience members and for the actors by turning off your cell phone and other electronic devices (iPods, games, etc.). Not only will it be historically inaccurate, but it can be very distracting, not to mention embarrassing, when a cell phone goes off during a performance. The lights from cell phones, iPads, and other electronic devices are also a big distraction, so please turn them off.

• We’re sure that you would never stick your gum underneath your chair or spill food and drinks, but because we try to keep this theatre beautiful, we ask that you spit out your gum before entering the theatre and leave all food and drinks in the lobby.

• We don’t want you to miss out on any of the action of the play, so please visit the restroom before the performance begins.

During the performance:

• Please feel free to have honest reactions to what is happening on stage. You can laugh, applaud and enjoy the performance. However, please don’t talk during the performance; it is extremely distracting to other audience members and the actors. Save discussions for intermission and after the performance.