‘Joe Turner’ most spellbinding, emotionally rich of August Wilson’s Century Cycle plays
Next up at Theatre Conspiracy at the Alliance for the Arts during this, it’s silver anniversary season, is Joe Turner’s Come and Gone by August Wilson and directed by Sonya McCarter. The show opens March 1.
Joe Turner’s Come and Gone is the third installment of August Wilson’s Century Cycle Series that Theatre Conspiracy has produced. The Cycle charts the African-American experience through each decade of the 20th century. One of the most spellbinding and emotionally rich plays in Wilson’s Century Cycle, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone shines a light on newly-freed men and women determined to take their rightful place in a new American world.
This segment opens in a Pittsburgh boarding house in 1911. Owners Seth and Bertha Holly play host to a makeshift family of people who come to stay – some for days, others longer. The residents include proprietors, an eccentric clairvoyant with a penchant for old country voodoo, a young homeboy up from the South and a mysterious stranger searching for his wife. Each denizen of the boarding house has a different relationship to a past of slavery as well as to the urban present.
“A large amount of the history taught about African-Americans centers on slavery, but very little is taught about the years following slavery,” says director and Alliance Community Engagement Coordinator Sonya McCarter. “August Wilson does a beautiful job of bringing to light the triumphs and tragedies of a people searching for a place to fit in a post slavery world. As with most of Wilson’s work, this play has universal appeal as it highlights a person’s search for identity, love and a place to call home.”
The production only runs through March 17, so reserve your seats early.
February 17, 2019.
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About the Author
Tom Hall is both an amateur artist and aspiring novelist who writes art quest thrillers. He is in the final stages of completing his debut novel titled "Art Detective," a story that fictionalizes the discovery of the fabled billion-dollar Impressionist collection of Parisian art dealer Josse Bernheim-Jeune, thought by many to have perished during World War II when the collection's hiding place, Castle de Rastignac in southern France, was destroyed by the Wehrmacht in reprisal for attacks made by members of the Resistance operating in the area. A former tax attorney, Tom holds a bachelor's degree as well as both a juris doctorate and masters of laws in taxation from the University of Florida. Tom lives in Estero, Florida with his fiancee, Connie, and their four cats.