Theatre
Dutchman
Amiri Baraka · 1964
Synopsis
A New York subway car. A young Black man of twenty, in a three-button suit, reads in an almost empty carriage. A white woman of thirty gets on eating an apple, sits down beside him, offers him one and talks to him. She provokes him, flatters him, mocks his suit and his student manners, and gets herself invited to a party. He ends up answering. The carriage fills up.
Context
The play was premiered off Broadway, at the Cherry Lane Theatre, in March 1964, and received the Obie for best American play the same year. Its author was still living in the Village among mostly white writers and was married to a white woman: he left both in 1965, after the assassination of Malcolm X, to found in Harlem the Black Arts Repertory Theatre/School, from which the Black Arts Movement took its name. The title refers to the ghost ship condemned to wander. In France, Antoine Bourseiller staged it in 1965 under the title Le Métro fantôme, in an adaptation by Éric Kahane.
Who it is for
A one-act play, under an hour, with two main characters. The verbal violence is continuous and the subject deliberately uncomfortable. Adapted into French by Éric Kahane.
Prizes and reception
Obie Award 1964, and the play that made LeRoi Jones known as a playwright, beyond the circle of poets.
Sources for this page 12
The pages consulted to check this page.