Theatre Conspiracy at the Alliance for the Arts in Fort Myers is performing August Wilson’s Pulitzer winning drama “The Piano Lesson.” The production, which opens April 20, is part of the theater company’s ongoing commitment to bringing Black theater to Southwest Florida.
“The Piano Lesson” brings audiences into the home of a Black family in Pittsburgh in 1936. Subplots abound, but the central conflict concerns an adult brother and sister, Boy Willie and Bernice, and the fate of the family’s prized heirloom – a piano – that once belonged to the white family that enslaved their ancestors.
Boy Willie, a sharecropper, wants to sell the piano to buy the land his ancestors once worked as slaves, while Bernice is emphatic about keeping it. The instrument’s worth as a touchstone to the family’s history is invaluable. It’s etched with carvings of the faces of their great-grandfather's wife and son during their enslavement. What’s more, the main characters’ father died while reclaiming the piano.
Sonya McCarter directs this production. While she personally leans in favor of Willie’s perspective, she says it’s easy to understand both characters’ points of view.
“Boy Willie, one of his lines in the show is ‘Land is the only thing God isn’t making any more of.’ The piano…it has a lot of history, but it can be recreated. You can build another one. But the land… The way for us to make a better life for ourselves. God, isn’t making any more of that. So, it’s more important to have the land. I understand that,” said McCarter.
“But I also understand where Bernice is coming from. How their father died, their ancestors, everything they went through to get this piano and how it was created and why it was created and there’s so much history. And even though it’s a source of pain for her, she doesn’t want to let it go.”
Actor Renee Freeman, who plays Bernice, says she supports her character’s position.
“As I tell Boy Willie, money can’t buy what that piano cost. And so that’s why my stance is, ‘it has to remain with us in this family. No one will ever appreciate what it cost them, and that was a lot of blood, sweat and tears,’” said Freeman.
The conflict brings the lasting impacts of slavery in America front and center, as well as economic and social inequality.
“It saddens me when I come to do an interview of any kind and say these words: Yes, this play is still relevant today. There are so many things that are still relevant at this time,” said McCarter.
“You have the owner of the land who is going to sell it to Boy Willie, but he’s selling it an exorbitant price because he knows that he can get that from him, where he’s already offered it to someone else at a lower price. And it’s that exploitation, that ‘Hey, because our family knows each other.’ Well, our family doesn’t just know each other. Your family owned my family.”
“The Piano Lesson” marks the fourth installment of playwright August Wilson’s American Century Cycle. It’s a series of ten plays that document and examine the Black experience in America across the decades of the 20th century. Theatre Conspiracy has committed to producing every play in the cycle. This show marks their fifth one to date.
McCarter has directed them all. The first show she ever directed was the stage adaptation of Toni Morrison’s “The Bluest Eye.” The book was recently banned from high schools in Pinellas County, although it’s since been returned to library shelves. Meanwhile, the Florida Department of Education recently rejected an Advanced Placement course in African American studies and last year, state lawmakers passed the “Stop Woke Act” Act, which limits students from learning about issues concerning race and gender. Portions of that law remain blocked, with U.S. District Judge Mark Walker calling it “positively dystopian” in a scathing injunction.
McCarter said that when producing plays that tell Black stories, it’s important to remain cognizant of Florida’s current political climate.
“There’s so much of our history that is being devalued. So, it is now, kind of even more our responsibility… as Black actors and performers to make sure that those stories are told and passed down,” said McCarter.
“It’s the same with this show because August Wilson, even though the shows that he writes are fictional, they are based in real historic times and things that happened around that time…So, yes, I think it’s important for us to continue to do these types of shows and to share that history and our experiences as Black Americans.”
Theatre Conspiracy’s next show from August Wilson’s American Century Cycle will be the multi-Tony-award winning “Radio Golf.”
In the meantime, performances of the “Piano Lesson” take place in the Fould’s Theatre at the Alliance for the Arts in Fort Myers.
If You Go:
Theatre Conspiracy’s production of August Wilson’s “The Piano Lesson” at the Alliance for the Arts: 10091 McGregor Blvd., Fort Myers 33919
Thurs, April 20 -22 and April 27-29 at 7:30 p.m.
Sun, April 30 at 2 p.m.
Click hear for the full Gulf Coast Life Arts Edition conversation about this production with director Sonya McCarter and actor Renee Freeman.
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