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Current Picks
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Written by Wanda Sabir
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Tuesday, 30 April 2013 |
We remember Richie Haven, folk singer and activist who made his transition last month. We want to say Happy Birthday to Yuri Kochiyama and to El Hajj Malik El Shabazz. congratulations to my nephew Wilfred Batin, 9 years old who was one of two honor roll students from Rosa Parks Elementary School honored this year at Grace Cathedral. Happy Mother's Day to all the women who deserve more than a day to honor them. Congratulations to all the College Graduates!
Tour de Cure this weekend in the Gold Country
Support me in making my $1000.00 goal! I am a Red Rider which means I am personally affected by the disease. Read my story at: http://main.diabetes.org/goto/wandasabir If anyone wants to join me in the 62 miles ride, I'd love company (smile).
Theatre
“The Expulsion of Malcolm X,” Larry Americ Allen’s epic play is closing its successful run this weekend, May 3, 4, 5 at the Southside Theatre in Fort Mason Center, Building D, 3rd Floor, in San Francisco. Written more than 20 years ago, “Expulsion” tells a story many theatres were afraid to touch, but not COVE or Colors of Vision Entertainment, where DeJuan Conner is Executive Producer and CEO. He is also portraying El Hajj Malik so well, I thought it was he on stage. COVE also produced A Soldiers Play, which had a very successful run in this same theatre. Abbie Rhone who directed A Soldier’s Play, is cast as Elijah Muhammad in Expulsion. Yes, he is the weasel who kicks his biggest fan out of the Nation (smile). Seriously though, Rhone portrays the elder leader with finesse, his Elijah a man who rules with an iron hand, yet is upset by petty rivalry and jealousy directed towards MX.
Under Lange’s direction, Conner’s MX is a family man who loves his wife Betty portrayed well by Kreshenda Jenkins and his kid brother Reginald portrayed by Terry Stanley. Reginald who introduced MX to Islam ends up leaving the fold, though not of his own choice. It is here that MX’s loved for the Messenger is tested. Conner’s MX is obedient, yet thoughtful. Blinded initially by values he assumes all in leadership uphold he cannot believe his teacher, father, mentor would betray the laity as he has. And even when his eyes are fully open, he does not curse his teacher, he bids him peace, his very posture one of respect, yet he can no longer participate in a ministry that is hypocritical.
In Conner’s able hands, Americ’s MX is principled and kind. This is a lesson for youth today who talk about elders earning their respect. Even when MX was expulsed from a community he loved, he did not curse his savior.
The Expulsion of Malcolm X is epic in length and quite comprehensive in its breath as over 14 scenes, and two acts we get to traverse the terrain that was Jim Crow and the rise of the Civil Rights Movement. MX questions the Nation of Islam’s “do-nothing” policy when he sees Martin King putting his and other people’s lives on the line to combat racial injustice. He asks Muhammad about this and is told, the NOI is a religious organization not a political one. I thought about today and how Islamic organizations still lag behind other religious groups when it comes to fighting injustice and providing sanctuary for those in need whether that is battered women, single parents, AIDS victims, the homeless or any number of social ills.
I am a product of the Nation of Islam in San Francisco, was a vanguard, a Junior Lieutenant, graduated from Muhammad University at 15 years old, top of my class and valedictorian, met my husband there, and was present when the Hon. Elijah Muhammad died and the community went in multiple directions. I remember sitting in what is now the Fillmore Auditorium listening to the Messenger each month on fourth Sundays. Sometimes he was too sick to speak long, so his late son, Wallace Muhammad later Warith Din Muhammad or Min. Farrakhan would speak. This happened in the play too. Suffering from asthma, the Hon. Elijah Muhammad left the speaking to Minister Malcolm while he recuperated. The scenes where the two men are juxtaposed –their words overlapping one another are quite powerful. For tickets or information on Expulsion, call 510-213-0401 or visit brownpapertickets.com
April was a busy month with quite a few cinematic highlights among them Shola Lynch's wonderful film, Free Angela Davis and All Political Prisoners (2013). Sister Lynch knows how to tell a story right. If folks know her Shirley Chisholm: Unbought, Unbossed (2004), then one can certainly say, in this director's capable hands black history, especially stories untold, get their day on the screen from a perspective that is profound, as is this latest work about a woman who is still going strong, Dr. Angela Y. Davis. I hadn't realized prior to seeing the film that the campaign to free Davis was a global one, nor had I known the details of her relationship with Comrade George Jackson, how he inspired her and helped her survive captivity, which before her arrest was theoretical.
Lynch uses historic footage, juxtaposed with interviews with Davis, her attorneys and family, like sister, Fania Davis and her mother. This interactive narrative gives the film depth and helps its audience make an easy interpretative leap which is not hard to fathom given the fact that not much if anything has changed in America’s judicial system.
A young fiery Davis is shown articulate, brave and fierce at 28 when she is arrested and accused of murder, kidnapping and conspiracy in the 1970 death of a state judge who was shot with one of several weapons she had bought. After 18 months in prison, she was acquitted by an all white jury in Santa Clara County. Some of my favorite parts of the film are when she is on the lamb, her brother, Reginald Davis, taking her from one safe house to another, one motel or hotel to another as the two evaded an FBI manhunt. What is interesting is the conversation the director has with one of the FBI agents, who reflects on this time, as footage of Richard Nixon and J. Edgar Hoover speak about the threat the Black Panther Party and the movement for black liberation are to National Security and why all such mobilization needs to be stopped immediately.
Davis speaks about why she didn't leave the country like Assata Shakur, and her defense strategy. The presiding Judge Richard E. Arnosan, who ruled in her case to grant bail and the young farmer who put up his farm as collateral when Aretha Franklin, was out of the country when the decision was reached, let her stand trial as a free woman.
California's timely decision to suspend the death penalty (a crucial moment) was a key reason why Davis was able to get released on bail. The charges brought against her were a capital crime, and had the death penalty been an option—by legal gas, she could have been sentenced to death.
The film is shot with serendipitous moments like this. The prosecution plays up the fact that Davis’s guns were used in the courthouse siege and the fact that Davis ran when charged. Branton asked the jurors to close their eyes and visualize what is means to be black in America, so they could empathize with Davis when she refuses to turn herself over to the FBI. He has them walk backward into United States history to enslavement of his and Angela’s people, then forward through Jim Crow all the way to the present where black life was pretty worthless on the Stock Exchange— even peace warriors like Dr. Martin King.
I love it when Fania Davis, esq., is in Paris speaking at a rally in French. Then later on when Davis wins her case and she travels the world thanking her supporters; the span and reach is once again breathtaking. Reminds me of when Mandela walked out of Robben Island into the world’s hearts. The woman’s impact is HUGE! Critical Resistance didn’t wear an organizational hat yet, but certainly it was conceived in these moments of her life—Davis was living it as were her supporters against a mighty nation, and she won.
The drama of the court room is also big in Free. The decision to have her case tried separately from Ruchell Cinque Magee, one of the only shootout survivors’ case is addressed, along with Davis’s membership in the black wing of the Communist Party, and then governor Reagan and UC Regents vote to dismiss Davis from her position at UCLA. See http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/03/08/home/davis-campaign.html
Having the legal defense team share on screen in recent interviews why Davis had a black legal team and why the team, which include women legal experts too, decided to let Davis make her own opening remarks which were not about her trial, rather the sexist remarks lead Prosecutor Albert Harris, Jr. made in his opening statement--placing Davis's alleged participation in the Marin Courthouse shooting on the fact that she was in love with Jonathan Jackson's brother George.
One doesn't get to see the icon, Davis within a cultural context, a milieu which includes family who are just as devoted to justice and freedom as their more publicly recognized daughter, sister and aunt, Angela Davis. What I love the most about the film is its title: Free Angela Davis and All Political Prisoners. The call: Free Them All is an affirmation as much as it is the title of a thought provoking wake-up call.
Daphne Muse, writer, poet and social commentator, was a secretary for the defense team and writes on her blog about Leo Branton: “He was one of the first to hire consultants to develop psychological profiles of jurors and demand fairer diversity of juries. Psychologist Dr. Tom Hilliard, Anne Ashmore (Poussaint-Hudson) and psychiatrist Price Cobb, Jr. were part of the team who contributed their expertise to voir dire potential jurors. As secretaries for the defense team, Marlene Cassel and I came to witness his brilliance, legal acumen and forthrightness everyday of that trial.
 “Branton always swooped through the office in suits that bespoke the unbridled and astute confidence and experience he possessed. He turned litigation into well crafted performance art; after all it was his desire to be an actor that paved the way for him to become a lawyer. He was exemplary in his ability to cross examine witnesses and during the trial, he put eye witness testimony in a tailspin and as a result, a witness pointed out Kendra Alexander as the woman he saw in the Marin Courtroom and not Angela. He was so masterful in the courtroom that his legal charisma mesmerized the presiding Judge Richard E. Arnosan, the bailiffs, jurors, spectators and many members of the press; it also totally flummoxed Prosecutor Albert Harris, Jr. and his team. Harris looked as though he’d been bricked with a brief, the day of the verdict. I often wonder if the jurors knew that Leo was black. He had that kind of racial ambiguity, for some, where he could represent either or.
“With thirty-six spectator seats available, entry into Courtroom Number one of the Santa Clara County Courthouse in San Jose, California were at a premium and hundreds of people jostled for positions each day to get in on a first come, first-served basis. On the one occasion Howard was able to get me in, I witnessed firsthand the jaw dropping performance Branton brought into the hallowed halls of that courtroom filled with an historical tension quite like none ever witnessed before in the United States. With so many precedents set in litigating the Angela Davis Trial, it really was indeed one of the major trials of the century. I’m sure John Jay (first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court), Clarence Darrow (attorney for the legendary, early 20th century Scopes Trial) and Charlotte E. Ray (first known African American woman lawyer) all a turning in afterlife awe. The power of his closing argument still resonates beyond that chamber into curricula in law schools throughout the United States. The trial transcript of the closing argument (May 30 to June 1, 1972) is available at the Bancroft Library, UC, Berkeley, and the Angela Davis Papers and in the Howard Moore Jr. Papers, Woodruff Library, Manuscripts and Rare Books, Emory University, Atlanta, GA.
Ms. Muse says that she invited the attorney to a holiday party December last year where he spoke of Davis’s trail and its “significant milestones and precedents.” Though many people know Davis’s story, not many Muse reflected know Branton. She continues, “His presence and words brought a serious dimension of reality to that history. With a world-wide movement mobilized and upon being acquitted, Branton told Angela that she was the most powerful woman in the world” (http://daphnemuse.blogspot.com/ ).
You can listen to Branton speak at the party by going to this link by videographer Mateenah Floyd-Okanlawon: www.youtube.com/watch?v=YvErKfaD7oA
Executive produced by among others: Jay-Z, Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith, Free Angela is the product of cooperative economics or Ujima (smile).
The film is having a special screening, Tuesday, May 07 7:00pm - 9:21 p.m. at Landmark Piedmont Theatre in Oakland. Tickets are $12.00 general. This screening is being presented by Sankofa Events in solidarity with the Mayor's Office of the City of Oakland, Critical Resistance, KPFA and SFSU Women and Gender Studies Department.
For tickets, visit http://www.tugg.com/events/3958#.UXr9BZOOV0E.email
Virgin Soul
We celebrate with author Judy Juanita the publication of her first novel, Virgin Soul. The novel is a tour de force featuring Geneice Hightower who takes us on a journey through the Black Arts & Revolutionary Movements of the '60s, most notably the Black Panther Party for Self Defense. Up close and personal, this old soul in a young body, smart and cute and hip, when she needs to be, innocent and fierce yet always honest, is a for real foot-soldier, movement-woman, who attends Oakland City College, hosts Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture) at her flat, which becomes a SafeHouse, learns to clean and assemble guns, dodges police bullets, graduates from SF State, feeds kids breakfast, tutors in Bayview Hunter's Point, recites poetry, gets laid, and ultimately finds herself (smile).
Yes, it's that exciting. Just back from the LA Book Festival, other tour dates and special events like the one this Saturday, May 4, 2 p.m. at the 57th Street Gallery where the author will be joined by veteran Panthers in a panel discussion about this important history. You can also catch her at Moe’s Books in Berkeley May 1 at 7:30PM; at Book Passage in San Francisco, at the Ferry Bldg. at 6PM, Thursday, May 2; Saturday, June 2, she’ll be at the Peralta Hacienda Historical Park at 2 p.m. If you get to this event, my younger daughter, TaSin and I are a part of an exhibit “Telling Stories.” Give us a listen and let me know what you think (smile). Listen to an interview with Judy a couple of weeks ago on the air: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2013/04/19/wandas-picks-radio-show
SFIFF at 56
The San Francisco International Film Festival continues with quite a few Pan African and other films of note, among them two riveting films The Pirogue dir. Moussa Touré, God Loves Uganda dir. Roger Ross Williams and Tall as the Baobab Tree dir. Jeremy Teicher. These three films look at the systematic economic disenfranchisement of Africa whether that is the global impact of trade on families who have to send their sons and daughters on perilous journeys across the Atlantic ocean on boats ill-equipped for the hazards to the implementation of an educational system that undermines community values as it seeks to strengthen its nation’s ability to compete and survive.
When one thinks about the enslavement of African people which is how many in the Diaspora landed in their present locations, and the subsequent colonialism religion is the major culprit, then and now. African American director Roger Ross Williams, in his film, God Loves Uganda, takes an unprecedented look at a major church whose mission is to evangelize Africa, with a special focus on Uganda, what Lou Engle, International House of Prayer, calls “The Pearl of Africa.”
How a country can go from self-determination and autonomy to a nation of zealots who have allowed white America to come in toting bibles and preaching their version of Jesus’s gospel, a version that is intolerant of difference, especially sexual difference, is uncanny.
I remember when Uganda was granted aid money during George W. Bush’s tenure, with the stipulation that abstinence would be the only prevention method allowed, so a country which had been the model for other nations regarding HIV/AIDS prevention, saw its numbers increase at an alarming rate. Then a bill was introduced which would make homosexuality a crime punishable by death. A list of gay activists, their supporters such as Bishop Christopher Senyonjo was published and David Kato, was beaten to death January 2011. The vehement atmosphere engendered by such legislation fueled by American evangelist Scott Lively whose 2009 call to “Kill the Gays,” was the culmination of a high profile campaign begun in 2002 in Uganda.
Last year, I interviewed the directors, KATHERINE FAIRFAX WRIGHT - filmmaker; MALIKA ZOUHALI-WORRALL - filmmaker and LONGJONES, one of the subjects in the film Call Me Kuchu, a film that tells David Kato’s story and that of others who continue his dangerous work to preserve the rights of this sexual minority in Kampala, Uganda: http://www.trbimg.com/img-5179eaf9/turbine/la-la-me-0425-branton-obit2-jpg-20130425/600
The director writes: “I thought about following the activists-brave and admirable men and women-who were fighting against these policies. But I was more curious about the people who, in effect, wanted to kill me. (According to the provisions of the Anti-Homosexuality Bill, I could be put to death or imprisoned.) Notably, almost every evangelical I met – American or Ugandan – was polite, agreeable, even charming. Yet I knew that if the bill passed, there would be blood on the streets of Kampala.
“What explains that contradiction? What explains the murderous rage and ecstatic transcendence? In the well-known trope about Africa, a white man journeys into the heart of darkness and finds the mystery of Africa and its unknowable otherness. I, a black man, made that journey and found – America” (http://www.godlovesuganda.com/film/directors-statement/ ).
God Loves Uganda screens at the 56th Annual San Francisco International Film Festival, Mon., May 6 (8:15 p.m.), Tues., May 7 (3:30 p.m.) and Thurs., May 9 (8 p.m.) at the Kabuki Theatre in San Francisco. Visit sffs.org
In veteran Senegalese dir. Moussa Touré’s film, “The Pirogue,” a fishing vessel turns into a chariot to heaven, and the keepers of The Pearly Gates speak Castilian Spanish. Opening with a wrestling match where once again the protagonist’s fighter looses, he is convinced that perhaps he should leave home for heaven, though from what we can see, he seems to be doing okay—son is healthy, his wife is happy, his spoiled brother loses his job yet can still buy electronic devices. But everyone is leaving the country, including his kid brother to pursue a music career. Fishing is becoming a less viable livelihood, ditto cattle herding, and as African men find themselves at a loss with how to support their families and villages in an ever increasing global community where foreign investors can undercut a formerly regional economy, they make the treacherous and dangerous trek across the water. If they make it, their worries supposedly are over and they can send money to their impoverished families or communities. So our fisherman is convinced to navigate the pirogue. He receives his money up front and leaves it with his wife. There are 30 men aboard and as he checks his GPS, yes GPS –the immediacy of this problem hits the audience, which has its collective memories of “boat people.” I think of little Cuban national Elián Gonzalez and Haitian-born American writer Edwidge Danticat uncle, Reverend Joseph Dantica, was allowed to die in the Krome detention center in Florida. Western Nations are perceived as sanctuary or preferred destinations for refugees escaping the consequences of industrialized greed and conquest, yet why would an African expect their former masters to treat them fairly? Reminds me of a character in playwright Matthew Lopez's The Whipping Man, Simon, who expects his master to keep return after the war and pay him a sum of money—a personal 40 acres deal. The man’s back is scarred and his memories of enslavement are horrific, yet he holds out for a measure of humanity despite all he has experienced which show inhumanity and untrustworthiness.
Within the titular boat men from a variety of nations, with distinct languages and cultures remind us of another journey 100s of years or so before in the opposite direction—this time the living cargo isn’t sure of its welcome. Black bodies are no longer trading high on Western Markets.
Tossing on the high seas, fearing for their lives, some men regret their decisions to leave home. Perhaps there were other choices, a bit safer, ones that didn’t mean splintering families –Africa has been fleeced, but it doesn’t need to remain bare if nations refuse to be exploited any longer.
The Pirogue screen one last time, Thursday, May 2, 6:45 at New People Cinema in San Francisco.
The director promotes films by African filmmakers in my home, Rufisque, Senegal, and since 2011, he has been the director of documentary filmmaking at FESPACO. To read more about him see: the https://www.festivalscope.com/director/tour-moussa
Lorraine Hansberry Theatre presents: Marcus Gardley’s “Black Odyssey” A Reflection
Marcus is brilliant, and at almost 30 his light is shining so brightly, at the end of the two act play, not only was I blinded, I was speechless--so full of emotions was I. And I was not alone, men and women were wiping away tears as Ulysses Lincoln made it home.
Based loosely on Greek playwright Homer's “Odyssey”, this journey was one most in the audience recognized, yet perhaps had not articulated it so masterfully prior to this production. We know the trail of bones, whether it is Black Mary Wilkes following Aunt Ester Tyler: a former slave and a "soul-cleanser's" instructions so that Citizen Bartlow can get right with himself in August Wilson’s “Gem of the Ocean” or Great Aunt Tina (Athena) pleading with her dad, Great Grand Daddy Deus (Zeus) to talk to Great Grand Paw Sidin (Percedian) to save her kin from drowning.
It is interesting that like Wilson’s “Citizen,” Gardley’s “Ulysses Lincoln,” a Gulf War veteran who has blinded Polyphemus, a one eyed cyclops, Great Grand Paw Sidin's or Poseidon's son, which is why Sidin is trying to drown him, also has to go to the City of Bones. He needs to find his story or learn his history so he can get home.
As Ulysses Lincoln travels, he meets friends and foes--even family. Maps are etched in hands and he finds paths or trails similar to his own. These familiar markings make the journey, if not less harrowing, certainly more satisfying for Ulysses who has been lost so long his memories are legends he shares with his new friend, Nella Pell. She saves his life.
Stranded people with limited rations are not the most sympathetic rescuers, but the child Nella Pell convinces her dad to not shoot him and her mom to let him stay.
There is a lot of water imagery, floods and heavy rains—Is it New Orleans after the levees break or some other water odyssey? Ulysses's is at first confused, until he realizes that he is in the future, the journey a memory past, one previously inaccessible, thus the forced journey. He will not get a pass home until he knows where he comes from, not physically which when asked he'd say, New York City, but a deeper look at home as in who are his people? How many generations can he name? What ancestors' stories does he carry in his bones?
Gardley writes of blood memories, trapped energy, clotted or stuck souls unable to get home. Ulysses's meets a family floating on a roof--there is a flood and Artez and Alsendra Sabine wait as the water rises for the "government" to save them. Ulysses's a bit less optimistic tries to get them to notice the water rising and abandon the hope of something outside themselves saving the couple and their daughter, Nella Pell.
What is blood but water? First blue and then when air hits it the color changes? The human body is 90 percent water and if the planet is a metaphor for our vehicles for this journey, then what does this memory-blood-water connection mean?
The sibling rivalry between Paw Sidin and big brother Daddy Deus is so amusing, as are the relationships between other characters, I guess too numerous to name that the actors portray, yet are absent from the program.
The major characters are nine (9), yet many more fill out the story like Malachi (Telemachus), Ulysses's son who is born while his dad is away and does not know him; Ulysses's wife, Benevolence Nausicca Sabine (Penelope).
In the world these characters inhabit, while gods technically can't cross each other, Great Aunt Tina , leaves home to go to stay with Ulysses while he is away. Hanging with human beings changes her. She loses her looks and the human container starts to give her pain and trouble. Magic ceases to work in this realm or perhaps what she notices how hard the life her Ulysses and others trapped in this realm manage.
Ancestors speak to Ulysses. He dreams and in this state he and his wife Benevolence speak.
There was much to recommend Black Odyssey: the staging, which was marvelous, especially the various songs and choreography and the cast, which was stellar. When Aldo Billinglea's Ulysses makes it home to Benevolence (Britney Frazier), one sees tears rolling down his cheeks. And then there is the single mother, Benevolence--she wants to believe her husband is gone, but something makes her continue to hold on even after at year 14 years she almost gives up.
Margo Hall as Great Aunt Tina, exemplifies how much our ancestors love us and how hard they work for Great Uncle Paw Siddin, portrayed by Darryl V. Jones, our salvation and happiness even if their advocacy doesn't work out for the best. Aunt Tina begs her dad to stop Paw Siddin, but his hands are ethically tied.
“Black Odyssey” covers the period Ulysses's been lost, black people from our earliest memory of enslavement to the present. Stranded on rooftops waiting for a savior, Ulysses's sees the Four Little Girls from Birmingham, Emmit Till from Chicago, Martin King and others. Is this his fate to be stranded?
If Ulysses's represents post-Apocalypse or life after captivity, then how much longer must we wander as a people? When will our choices open the hinges which are rusted shut? True, like Ulysses we've inherited trauma--mother dead before he was born, Ulysses is without family or at least he thinks he is an orphan until he starts traveling and realizes how much family there is waiting to claim him.
The memory is in the blood and perhaps one has to spill the blood to release the spirit trapped inside? Sounds like what happened with Jesus--the trapped divinity wasn't released until crucifixion. That's when the magic begins--water becomes buoyant whereby Jesus can walk on its surface. What does he learn while blue that he didn't know when the water was red?
Paw Siddin admits to his stirring the waters, yet, Ulysses does have choices. Paw Siddin reminds me of Olukun, the orisha who rules the deepest waters. Post traumatic slave syndrome, this genetic memory and our participation in its continued perpetuation that is, our own enslavement is no skinny dip.
The cast is rounded out by: Steven Anthony Jones, LHT Artistic Director, and the director of this production as he plays the role of Artex Sabine; Halili Knox is a number of characters, her primary one is Alsendra Sabine; Kehinde Koyejo as Nella Pell; Dimitri Woods as Malachi; Carl Lumbly as Great Grand Daddy Deus; Bert van Aslsburg as stage manager.
Visit www.lhtsf.org or call (415) 474-8800 to find out about subscriptions, other free readings. The next one is May 4, 2 p.m., at MoAD We Are Proud to Present by Jackie Sibblies Drury.
The playwright's work was a part of Bay Area Playwright's Festival about two years ago. Listen to the interview: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2011/07/15/wandas-picks
Another film which is also shot in Senegal in a remote village where education has just been introduced within the past decade and the changes this means for a community where girls were married off as child brides, literacy was not necessarily widespread and chiefs still were consulted on major decisions. In this setting we meet two girls, Coumba and her little sister Debo. The stories are based on the young people, whom the director Jeremy Teicher met when in the village just outside Mbour for a shoot as a college student. Unfortunately the youth are not traveling with this film, which is having much success on the film festival circuit. I do not know why they are not here, since it is their story, reminds me a bit of Kathryn Stockett's “The Help.” She didn’t live the story, and her protagonist didn’t either yet both the fictional and actual novelist, got all the glory. “The help” didn’t get to move to New York and start a writing career. The screenplay softens these edges quite a bit. In the novel it’s pure exploitation. Nonetheless, I am giving Teicher the benefit of the doubt as the villagers liked the film and he employs Africans on both ends of the production. Tall as the Baobab Tree dir. Jeremy Teicher screens: Sun., May 5 1:30 KAB; May 7 6:00 New People; May 8 1:00 New People. Here is an archival interview from a couple of weeks ago: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2013/04/24/wandas-picks-radio-show
Other films to note: Let the Fire Burn dir. Jason Osder Sun., May 5 (9 p.m.), Wed., May 8 (6:15 p.m.), Thurs., May 9 (6:30 p.m.); A River Changes Course dir. Kalyanee Mam (Sun., May 5 1 p.m. at New People); Salma dir. Kim Longinotto (Thurs., May 2 (6:15 p.m.), Sat., May 4 (2 p.m. ), Fatal Assistance dir. Raul Peck (Mon. May 6 6:30 BAM/PFA; May 7 9:15 KAB; May 8 6:45 KAB); Visit www.sffs.org
On the Fly
Ms. Ruth Beckford is having a luncheon at Geoffrey's on 14th Street in Oakland this month to celebrate retirement and think out loud about "what's next?" There is life after 70, 80 even 90 years old. Don't miss an opportunity to listen to the elders speak. I am not intentionally leaving the date out; as of this writing, I do not know when the event is happening (smile). Ms. Beckford told me about it two-three months ago, and Mrs. Belva Davis told me she was on the panel when I spoke to her before her gala celebration. If I wrote it down, I have since lost the paper bearing the details, so if anyone knows, send me an email please. I'd like to attend. 13th Annual Malcolm X Jazz Arts Festival May 18, 2013, 11-7 at San Antonio Park, in Oakland, CA. Visit www.eastsideartsalliance.org Gina Breedlove’s CD Release Party at Freight and Salvage Sunday, May 5, 8 p.m. in Berkeley, CA. Listen to an interview at http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2013/04/26/wandas-picks-radio-show The NORTHERN CALIFORNIA BOOK AWARDS, is Sunday, May 19, 1:00 pm. San Francisco Main Library, Civic Center, 100 Larkin, enter on Grove, Koret Auditorium. Reception follows in the Latino/Hispanic Meeting Room. In "For Every Mountain," veteran Bay Area playwright, Beverly Brown’s Totally Led Ministries brings her play to El Cerrito Theatre, 540 Ashbury Avenue, El Cerrito, CA, May 4-5, 2013. Tickets for the play are now available. General seating is $25 per person. Children (age 15 and under) $15 at the door only. Group rates for ten or more persons are discounted to $22 per person. For ticket information, visit totallyled.org or contact Beverly Brown at (510) 677-7046,
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Third Annual San Francisco Green Festival is Thursday, May 30-Wednesday, June 5, 2013. Visit sfgreenfilmfest.org
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Last Updated ( Tuesday, 30 April 2013 )
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Written by Wanda Sabir
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Wednesday, 03 April 2013 |
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Sunday, March 10, 2013, marked the 100th anniversary of General Harriet Tubman’s passing. That day, my email box received quite a few emails about Walking for Harriet http://lockerroom.girltrek.org/
This 100th anniversary coincides with the establishment of the Harriet Tubman Underground Railroad National Monument as the 399th unit of the National Park System (to open in 2015). The new national monument is located on Maryland’s Eastern Shore and includes large sections of landscapes that are significant to Tubman’s early life in Dorchester County and evocative of her life as an enslaved person and conductor of the Underground Railroad.
These include Stewart’s Canal, dug by hand free and enslaved people, including Tubman, between 1810 and the 1830s. Stewart’s Canal is part of the Blackwater National Wildlife Refuge and, although part of the new national monument, will continue to be managed by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
The new monument also includes the home site of Jacob Jackson, a free black man who used coded letters to help Tubman communicate with family and others. The Jacob Jackson Home Site was donated to the National Park Service by The Conservation Fund for inclusion in the new national monument. Visit www.nps.gov/hatu I had a great talk with Mr. Robert G. Stanton, former Director of the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, Senior Adviser to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of the Interior, Washington, D.C. on Friday,March 29, 2013 about the Harriet Tubman Monument and another monument dedicated this past Tuesday. See http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2013/03/29/wandas-picks-radio-show I am reading a really fascinating book called Harriet Tubman, Secret Agent: How Daring Slaves and Free Blacks Spied for the Union during the Civil War by Thomas B. Allen (2006 National Geographic). In this book, beautifully illustrated we learn of how black people risked their freedom and lives to convey information from the Confederacy to Union officers. Invisible and thought to lack intelligence, these black men and women, gathered important security information. John Brown is one of the cast, as well as Frederick Douglass. What is surprising are the women who singlehandedly right under the enemies nose passed top secret documents to comrades. This is just one of the many books one can purchase from Ashay by the Bay (smile). I bought this on Umoja last year.
Healing Arts
I attended the reception for the Transformative Visions exhibition at Studio One, 365 45th Street in Oakland Saturday, March 16, 2013, (up through April 5, 2013). It had been a heavy weekend and while not light, the music and visual medicine helped to lift my soul a bit higher. I'd been to the plantation just a day earlier and didn't possess the kind of currency that freed the bodies of those held behind bars. Spirits lighter? Perhaps, but this was of limited consolation when I thought about all the women left behind in California’s Central Valley, Chowchilla, California, when after eight hours the Sista-to-Sista team left.
I'd planned to ride my bike the bright sunny morning, don't think that happened, but I did exercise and get out to the artist reception before it ended where I was caught as I let go.
When I arrived I saw people hanging literally onto the words of those in the concert hall performance. I eased into the building and took advantage of the empty halls and looked at the art before me, first downstairs where I saw the work of artists I knew and just met and then on to the upstairs galleries where more art, including my daughter's and mine hung.
This was a feast for a soul starving in that moment for salvation and she found it. I think I stood in rapture, listening to analysis, hearing praise, learning new things about my work—a part of what I call, "African Window Panes, the two pieces, one photo taken in Touba City, Senegal, the other in Timbuktu, Mali. I heard hypotheses about how I took the photo. Most thought it was photoshopped. I was impressed. "Inner chambers of the heart. . ." was one comment. I probably should have jotted the comments down. Cheikh Amadou Bamba floats ethereally in one of the pieces. The pilgrimage happens around now. The film “I Bring What I Love,” (2008) directed by Elizabeth Chai Vasarhelyi, is about this pilgrimage and the Mouried Brotherhood.
It always makes me feel great connecting with artists; we are a different breed and then there was the music. Destiny Muhammad Project with Tammy Hall, wonderful woman and EW Wainwright whom I'd wanted to see with my own eyes, was great. Frederick Harris was on piano and the excellent bassist, Gary Brown, Destiny on the harp, of course. I hadn't planned to stay, just to pop in and then I saw EW and Karen Seneferu and Portia Anderson and Marcus Penn, Dafina Kuficha, and Rev. Liza—Ms. Transformative Visions and I had to sit down and listen.
It was so lovely and soul satisfying.
I left as the building was closing and folks were stacking chairs. David Glover, storyteller, and I headed for Palo Alto to Sofia University for the Ritual for the Waters of the World. It was a really safe space with the creative goddess present with us in her many representatives.
We were baptized as we stepped into the hall where we were met at the door by a woman with a bowl of water for us to wash our hands. Another person had a paper towel for us to dry our hands. "Come on Board and Ride the Waves to honor the Oceans, Rivers, and Streams. Come; dive deep as we explore Consciousness, Body, Emotions and Dreams." Yeye Luisah Teish was out in the water, waist deep.
We were all quickly submerged and didn't come for air until the program ended.
Our first meditation took us deep into the sea, that part of the ocean beyond light, beyond sound, beyond thought. I saw a film about people who dive so deep into the water that they literally forget to breathe, their minds so full of moments too full to realize the danger. I wanted to go there in a shallow way (smile). So I took a breath and swept the water swirling around my feet into my hands and passed them over my head baptizing myself over and over again.
Yeye kept telling us to stay moist, fertile, to stay open to new paths and ways that return and meet and fill each other before moving. We were blessed with the presence of healers and leaders who normally do not come out like Iya Nedra Williams, Olokun Priestess, who evoked the orisha who lives in the deepest parts of the waters; Mambo Susheel Bibbs, Damballah initiate known for her Mary Ellen Pleasant solo performances, opened the way with fire early on in the ceremony, Leilani Bireley, Daughters of the Goddess led us in a wonderful Hawaiian Hula, Arisika Razak, Goddess dancer danced to the rain, and the wonderful Ancestral Voices Choir directed by Shy Hamilton got everyone on their feet spontaneously. Then there was Iya Uzuri Amini, who called on Oshun as she had us pledge to take care of the children. It was good to see her again. She repeated her message shared Dec. 19, 2012, at the New Beginning Ritual Theatre Ceremony at JFK University in Berkeley. Ile Orunmila Oshun members had it going on, literally. At times folks just jumped into the water and started swimming across the room until the space grew thick with bodies co-mingling. Though the women certainly outnumbered the men, as we usually do, there was certainly a male presence with Vance Williams, Ifa priest and vocalist, Kaleo and Elise Ching, Masks-Artists, Tai Chi, Chi Gung, Bruce Silverman and the Orpheus World Music Ensemble and Hodari Toure, technician, community activist.
Life is sacred and all life comes from water—sweet water, the kind of flavor that whets the lips of creativity and inspiration even when exhales are trapped inside walls and other confined spaces. We hold these moments until we can freely express them. . . . We hold them open for our sisters who cannot find capacity for the fullness that is within. The glass is never empty as long as one woman, one girl is trapped, bound, caged, compromised by nets with hooks too sharp to escape.
We thought about blowing up the prison—yes, it is easy to go there when one can only visit the plantation, not shut it down. We realized, however, that we had to work smarter than the enemy so our eventual liberation was one that would be eternal rather than fleeting.
Ashay.
Season of Peace Concludes with Benefit for the East Bay Meditation Center: “The Dream Never Dies”
This conversation on Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Beloved Community and Where We Go from Here is with Alice Walker, Jack Kornfield and Michael Bernard Beckwith, moderated by Konda Mason, this Thursday, April 4, 2013, at 7 p.m. at Zellerbach Auditorium on the University of California, Berkeley Campus. There will be musical performances by Rickie Byars Beckwith and Raz Kennedy. Buy tickets on-line at http://tinyurl.com/av6pbk4
Meditation
Spirit Silence Retreat facilitated by Dr. Liza Rankow & the OneLife team, featuring Destiny Muhammad ~ Harpist from the Hood, Saturday • April 27th • 9:30AM - 4PM
Replenish your soul in the gentle power of intentional silence. Open to inner wisdom through a guided visioning process. Walk the meditation labyrinth. Share in sacred community. Savor the healing properties of sound and music. Enjoy a Healing Oasis at Holy Redeemer Center, 8945 Golf Links Rd., Oakland 94605, 10:00AM - 4:00PM (9:30AM arrival & registration).
Tuition: Sliding scale $35 ~ 100 (scholarships available ~ no one ever turned away for lack of funds). RSVP requested for planning purposes. Bring your journal, a potluck item for our shared lunch (we will supply some vegetarian basics), a water bottle, and anything you need to be comfortable for the day.
Holy Redeemer Retreat Center is located at 8945 Golf Links Road in Southeast Oakland. A hidden oasis at the foot of the Oakland Hills, it is 3/10th mile below (west of) the intersection of Hwy. 580 and 98th Ave. As you enter the wooded property and drive over the creek, look for the large meeting hall on your right. *This is a wheelchair accessible location. For more information or to register:
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, 510-595-5598, 6114 LaSalle Ave #759, Oakland, California 94611.
Theatre
Queen Rhodessa Resurrects SHE
I’d been looking forward to seeing Queen Rhodessa Jones in “The Resurrection of SHE” up at Brava Theatre in San Francisco through April 7, since we’d had a great chat a few weeks, maybe a month ago on Wanda’s Picks. I was not disappointed. I made my entrance on Good Friday, but then every Friday is good when Ms. Jones is in the house. SHE defies description. It’s a party, an encounter session without the couch—with original music, lyrics by Rhodessa Jones.
We travel in time with Jones who introduces us to the men in her life, which is an aspect of her story we do not know—well I didn’t (smile). Rhodessa or SHE is the first public person, I know who has lifted the matrilineal line each time she brings her women, the Medea Project together, so for her to call on the names of the patrilineal line starting with dad, Augustus Jones was change—she even later in the show asked us to call the names of the good men we know—right, it gives one pause. How often do you hear that? I hadn’t realized that Rhodessa came from a family of eight, her dad a romantic who like to see the world by rail. On one excursion he saw her mother walk by the car he was in and said to his companion, I am going to marry those legs, and he did. Rhodessa says her parents were married for 45 years.
They visit SHE on stage. The stories—those of strife and making due, like the one where Rhodessa’s uncle is told to leave town or face a lynching mob. The consequences of his absence means his family is re-enslaved, and it is 30 years before he returns home. SHE is Jones’s take on the whole Girl Scout campfire scene without the marshmallows and chocolate, but there is plenty of fire.
I’d been racing against the clock to Brava, to see SHE; with only 30 minute to cross the Bay Bridge I knew I was going to have to ask someone what I missed, but I made it in record time without speeding. I don’t speed, that is in a car—my mind sometimes speeds though. I have to catch myt thoughts before they escape. No seriously. I was so happy to arrive before 8 p.m., by the time I made it down to my great seat; I almost fell into Destiny and Cristwell Muhammad’s laps—almost. I caught myself. Later Cristwell is invited to dance with Rhodessa, his chuckle lightening the moment of conception (Rhodessa’s and the character she was telling us about).
Vaseline- is not an effective contraceptive the teenage Jones finds out.
SHE enters the theatre ceremoniously, carried shoulders of Idris Ackamoor and David Molina who provide a lovely landscape—SHE as rich audibly as she is visually— In retrospect I think we should have stood as she entered, as in All Hail, right? I am glad I had on ritual colors. Laid to rest behind a curtain, in a lush visually rich landscape the world was created and destroyed. Created and destroyed. Lots of fire.
Dressed in white Rhodessa carries us along as SHE populates the New World, increases its wealth and then forgets her value. Ships and stolen lives populate this new place, SHE is a girl who tells us of ships and rapes, horror and resistance. SHE survives this and other atrocities. “The Resurrection” is both myth and fable, a bit of fairytale too.
In the second half of SHE, Queen Rhodessa has the house lights up as she joins us in the audience. We get to feel how theatre transforms lives whether that is in the women’s prison in Johannesburg, a theatre in San Francisco, or San Bruno jail. SHE is too often locked up, keys tossed in rivers. The task Rhodessa has undertaken with the Medea Project, SHE and other incarnations is to peel away the layers of self-doubt, disbelief, fear, shame, hate—the barriers donned that keep SHE beyond reach the reach of she.
Some of the places Jones goes, the stories SHE lives to tell are quite harrowing, yet from the opening ceremony SHE lying in state carried from a place past to a place present, we know SHE will win. I remember one Medea season, the play ended with the women picking up shoes, using their fists, whatever they could get their hands on to fight the demons that haunted them, many three dimensional.
Attitude is everything and one thing one learns in SHE is one has to fake it until it becomes real.
Jones illustrates SHE. We see the young mother, the lithe woman dancing nude, the matron who has still got it despite the “hot flashes”—remember that play? Billboards and programs from past shows span to breath of SHE with co collaborator, Idris Ackamoor, Cultural Odyssey, founder and director of SHE. At a certain point the clock stops ticking—SHE all that matters, she the molecular link to what’s past is present.
“We are we,” Jones says. Peter Calendar says it too. “We is we.” Yet in this fuzzy warm axiom, Jones keeps it real and asks specifically “Who has your back? Who can you call when you need help?” The point is, none of us is alone or should be alone. Build your army; know where your allies are you might need to call on them.
SHE survives the Atlantic journey. Rhodessa as SHE survives Japan with a crazy boyfriend who tries to kill her, but Daddy comes to the rescue with an ax—Egun. Spirit is real and life is bigger than anything we can count, longer than a slide rule and bigger than any container. It is in these moments that Jones says theatre saved her life and we are glad because SHE has saved so many of ours.
“The Resurrection of SHE” is Ms. Jones at her most fabulous. She (Jones—smile) says she is writing her memoirs. Resurrection is a preview. Don’t miss it. It is up Thursday-Sunday, April 4-7. Brava Theatre Center is located at 2781 24th Street, San Francisco, CA 94110, (415) 641-7657 www.brava.org
Reflection
Resurrection Day found me looking for a clear space in the sky so that I could cycle down to the beach for a moment with the ancestors. Because I spend a lot of my life behind doors, under roofs away from direct sunlight, the appeal of indoor activities when I am away from work lessens as I get older. I’d rather ride my bike or climb something hard—hum, I mean something made of granite or fossilized matter (smile), than sit idle while others entertain me.
The ancestors we calling me Sunday, March 31, Cesar Chavez’s birthday, and well we found a spot of sky and rode 10 miles before the rain came tumbling from the skies. I was on the porch when the drizzle began.
The weekend was full of surprises like the double rainbow arched over the Ferry Building in San Francisco —it was a perfect arch. As TaSin and I made our trek toward the Bay Bridge on Embarcadero the light show on the bridge span began as well—waves of lights and clouds moved between the sections. It was really lovely. We’d had dinner at Elephant Sushi, Tamir and Nisa’s restaurant in San Francisco on Hyde Street in Russian Hill. My hair was wet, and I was not dressed for rain—it was sunny when we left the East Bay headed for our floatation appointment.
What’s floatation? It is a chamber where the subject experiences both sensory deprivation and isolation as she floats in a solution of salt. It was pretty cool after I got used to it. First I was afraid to lie down and then I grabbed onto a pipe I noticed before the door was shut and as I held on I was able to lie on my back and feel the sensation of weightlessness. I thought about my African ancestors and the darkness they must have experienced on the ships carrying them away from home. When I stretched my arms out to my sides, I imagined flying away like Africans fed up with the brutality must have done. In another chamber, TaSin wasn’t doing as well as me, so she left early. I’d just assumed I’d spend the 60 minutes exploring options until my time was up, so I went from thinking I might have to sit up for the entire hour to wanting to stay a bit longer once the time was up. The next day, the pain I often have in my shoulders was absent, so perhaps I did relax and let go of the tension I often hold in certain parts of my body.
This is where my hair got wet and after I washed it, there was no sun in the sky with rays aimed at drying my locs. Luckily, Elephant Sushi has heat and Nisa turned it on me (smile).
We were racing back to the East Bay for the Fatoumata Diawara/Oliver Mutakutzu double bill. What a fantastic show the two of them put on. The two artists are back in the Bay Area this summer in June.
On the Fly
Pharoah Sanders is in town this weekend in San Francisco, Thursday-Saturday, while Stanley Clarke is in Oakland on overlapping dates (smile). It doesn’t get any better, does it? Now add to that the 11th Annual Human Rights Film Festival at the University of San Francisco (USF), Thursday-Saturday, April 4-6, 2013, in Presentation Theater, 2350 Turk Boulevard (at Masonic), FREE and open to the public, http://www.usfca.edu/artsci/hrff/ and the 11th Annual Oakland International Film Festival April 4-7, 2013 from Oakland to Berkeley to San Leandro, often in the same day: http://www.oaklandinternationalfilmfestival.com/film-schedule/ also Thursday through Sunday, April 4-7, and well, one can only hope these films have theatrical releases. Oh, the Alvin Ailey Dance Company will be in Berkeley April 23-28, 2013. See http://www.calperfs.berkeley.edu/ 56th Annual San Francisco International Film Festival April 25-May 9, 2013: http://www.sffs.org Masjidul Waritheen presents its First Annual Halal Food Festival celebrating healthy lifestyles by showcasing halal cuisine, Saturday, April 6, 2013, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. at 1652 47th Avenue, Oakland, CA 94601. There will be children’s activities, health screenings, family fun, art and music. For information call (510) 992-3540
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Third Saturdays 7-9:30 p.m. at Bacheesos Live Arabic Music featuring beloved Egyptian Classics, April 20, May 18 and June 15 featuring Sarah Michael, Qanun, Mary Ellen Donald, and Terry Holgate, percussion with dancers Stasha and Brynn Mercedes, 246 Grand Avenue, in Oakland, (5100 891-1496. Lula Washington Dance Theatre presents “The Little Rock Nine,” Tuesday, April 9, 2013 at The Gallo Center for the Arts, 1000 I Street, downtown Modesto, CA, (209) 338-2100 or www.galloarts.org Tickets start at $10.00. This story of the nine African American children who risked their lives by enrolling in an all-white, segregated school and whose courage changed America is a legacy Ms. Washington knows well, as she was born near Little Rock in 1950. Duniya Dance and Drum Company and the African Advocacy Network present the Madness of the Elephant a West African Dance and Music Theatre performance exploring the reign of Guinea’s controversial first president and benefactor of traditional arts Sekou Toure, nicknamed “The Elephant.” With performances Friday-Saturday, April 5-6, 2013, 8 p.m. at Kanbar Hall at the Jewish Community Center, 3200 California Street (at Presidio). For tickets visit www.jccsf.org/arts (415) 292-1233. Tickets are $15-30.00. UniverSoul Circus is BACK! 2013 Mash It Up Tour April 4-14, 2013 at 633 Hegenberger Road (near Oakland Coliseum). Visit universoulcircus.com For group discounts call: 888-605-9997.
11th Annual Human Rights Watch Film Festival at USF Schedule
Thursday-Saturday, April 4-6, 2013 in Presentation Theater, 2350 Turk Boulevard (at Masonic), just west of Masonic, between Annapolis Terrace and Tamalpais Terrace the Festival will take place.
The goals of the Festival are to promote awareness and discussion of global human rights issues and explore challenges to human rights in specific locations. Additionally, this Festival seeks to strengthen USF's links with Bay Area human rights organizations, which we invite to participate in educating its audiences.
This 11th anniversary festival will showcase 11 selected films that address human rights abuses. For the fifth year, the festival will open with a selection of shorts produced by University of San Francisco (USF) students. Among the films screening are:
RWANDA, THE BEAUTY THAT STILL REMAINS
2012, 15 min, Director: Stacey Mahealani Johnston
Set in Post-Genocide Rwanda 2012, this film follows the Anne Frank Project and Mashirika Theater Company on their journey to portray the horror that occurred in 1994 and find the beauty of a once-divided society struggling to forgive through theater and storytelling.
HARTHAVEN CHILDREN HOME
2012, 15:17 min, Filmmakers: Karla Gallardo–Director. Jean Pierre Bitchokta–Executive Producer. Betsey J. Blosser–Executive Producer
This documentary was produced in Kpando, Ghana in the summer of 2012, for Haven Children Home, an orphanage whose mission is to assist HIV/AIDS orphans and young victims. The purpose of the video is to help the orphanage raise money for its day-today activities, and find sponsors for the children.
REPORTERO, 2011, Mexico/US, Filmmaker: Bernardo Ruiz, 72 min
* Selection of the Human Rights Watch Film Traveling Film Festival
* Selected by Cine Acción @ USF Q&A with Samuel Orozco, News and Information Director, Radio Bilingue Network, Oakland, CA
Reportero follows veteran reporter Sergio Haro and his colleagues at Zeta, a Tijuana, Mexico-based weekly, as they dauntingly ply their trade in what has become one of the most deadly places in the world to be a journalist. Since the paper's founding in 1980, two of the paper's editors have been murdered and the founder viciously attacked. "Impunity reigns in Mexico, especially here along the northern border," explains Adela Navarro, Sergio's boss and Zeta's co-director. Despite the attacks, the paper has continued its singular brand of aggressive investigative reporting, frequently tackling dangerous subjects that other publications avoid, such as cartels' infiltration of political circles and security forces. As a veteran member of Zeta's editorial team, Sergio contributes to the investigative crime pieces that are the paper's bread and butter, but at this stage of his career, he is also after what he calls the "deeper story" of the region—the human stories that tend to fall between the cracks. http://www.reporteroproject.com/
DEAR MANDELA, 2012, South Africa, Filmmakers: Dara Kell and Christopher Nizza, 90 min Q&A with filmmakers Dara Kell and Christopher Nizza
When Nelson Mandela was elected President of South Africa, his government was faced with a seemingly insurmountable task: providing a better life for those who had suffered under apartheid. The cornerstone of Mandela’s ‘unbreakable promise’ was an ambitious plan to ensure housing for all. When the South African government begins evicting shack dwellers from their homes, three friends living in Durban’s shantytowns refuse to be moved. Dear Mandela follows their journey to South Africa’s highest court as they invoke Nelson Mandela’s example and become leaders in a growing social movement led by shack dwellers. Mazwi, an enlightened schoolboy, Zama, an AIDS orphan and Mnikelo, a mischievous shopkeeper, discover that the new ‘Slums Act’ violates the rights enshrined in the country’s constitution. By turns inspiring, devastating and funny, the film offers a fresh perspective on the youth’s role in political change in a South Africa coming of age. Winner Grand Jury Prize and Best Documentary, Brooklyn Film Festival; Best South African Documentary, Durban International Film Festival; Best Documentary, Montreal International Black Film Festival. http://www.dearmandela.com/
MOBILE MEDICINE 2012, 7:45 min, Director: Kate Elston ('09 Alum)
Fifty million Americans do not have health insurance and suffer every day because of it. But thanks to a roaming clinic, hundreds of thousands of uninsured people have received free medical services over the last twenty years. Mobile Medicine is a project Kate Elston produced for a TV reporting class at UC Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism, where she currently studies.
5 BROKEN CAMERAS, 2011, France/Israel/Palestine, Filmmakers: Emad Burnat & Guy Davidi, 90 min
* Nominee, Best Documentary Feature, Academy Award 2013 Q&A with Rose Levinson, Adjunct Professor, USF Jewish Studies and Social Justice Program; Author of forthcoming book Death of a Holy Land: Reflections in Contemporary Israeli Fiction Winner at the Sundance Film Festival, 5 Broken Cameras is a deeply personal, first-hand account of non-violent resistance in Bil'in, a West Bank village threatened by encroaching Israeli settlements. Shot almost entirely by Palestinian farmer Emad Burnat, who bought his first camera in 2005 to record the birth of his youngest son, the footage was later given to Israeli co-director Guy Davidi to edit. Structured around the violent destruction of each one of Burnat's cameras, the filmmakers' collaboration follows one family's evolution over five years of village turmoil. Burnat watches from behind the lens as olive trees are bulldozed, protests intensify, and lives are lost. "I feel like the camera protects me," he says, "but it's an illusion." http://www.kinolorberedu.com/film.php?id=1276
Thursday, April 4
• 12:00 PM Selection of USF Student Shorts
• 1:30 PM Reportero
• 3:30 PM Nuclear Savage: The Islands of Secret Project 4.1
• 5:15 PM Dear Mandela
• 7:30 PM Sneak Preview: Bidder 70
Friday, April 5
• 12:00 PM USF Alumni Shorts
• 1:30 PM Justice for My Sister
• 3:30 PM In Shopian
• 4:45 PM The Harvest / La Cosecha: The Story of the Children Who Feed America
• 7:00 PM Ai Weiwei: Never Sorry
Saturday, April 6
• 12:00 PM Bay Area Student Shorts
• 2:00 PM Transgender Tuesdays: A Clinic In the Tenderloin
• 3:45 PM 5 Broken Cameras
• 6:00 PM The Invisible War
• 8:15 PM Project Z: The Final Global Event
This film festival is FREE and open to the public. The community is encouraged to attend. For details on each film, and the specific schedule of the three-day event, please visit: http://www.usfca.edu/artsci/hrff/
Music
Journey of the Shadow Opera
The World Premiere of the opera Journey of the Shadow based on an Andean folk tale, which tells the story of a boy who writes a letter to his father, a soldier in Afghanistan. At the heart of the story is the boy’s shadow which slips into the envelop and gets into trouble at a distant post office. History and politics and innocence of children affect this story set in the back drop of war. Shadow features music by Composer in Residence at the San Francisco Chamber Orchestra, Dr. Gabriela Lena Frank, with text by Pulitzer Prize winning playwright Nilo Cruz. There are three free performances: April 26, Friday, 8 p.m. at the Herbst Theatre, 401 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco; April 27, Saturday, 8 p.m. at First Palo Alto United Methodist Church, 625 Hamilton Ave., Palo Alto; and First Congregational Church, 2345 Channing Way, Berkeley.
Monday, April 8, 7 p.m. in Knuth Hall, Creative Arts Building at San Francisco State University is a workshop with the composer. Gabi will be on hand to talk about her new work and discuss its nuances with SF Chamber Orchestra. Maestro Benjamin Simon and SFCO musicians will bring Gabi’s notes to life for the first time, while Gabi reads Nilo Cruz’s story as a narrator. Visit www.sfchamberorchestra.org
The 9th Annual CubaCaribe Festival of Dance Music: Tributes to our Teachers
3 weeks of performances by master artists from the Caribbean Diaspora. Featuring special guests, Afro-Cuban modern dance company, Teatro de la Danza del Caribe from Cuba, appearing in the U.S. for the first time, April 12-28, 2013 at various locations in San Francisco and Oakland:
Week 1: Dance Mission Theater, 3316 24th Street, SF
Week 2: The YBCA Forum, 701 Mission Street, SF
Week 3: Laney College Theater, 900 Fallon Street, Oak
There are also special lectures and classes. Visit www.cubacaribe.org for all the details.
Tickets are $10-$35; April 12-14: $20 online; $20 door with a Special family matinee, April 14 at 3pm: $10 youth 12yrs and under; $17 adults; April 19: $30 online; $35 door; April 26-28: $20 online; $25 door. Tickets available at www.brownpapertickets.com and door.
Theatre
The Whipping Man at MTC
Imagine, it’s the end of the Civil War, 1864. The southland is trashed, the wounded owner’s son, “Caleb,” a Captain in the Confederate Army (Nicholas Pelczar) returns home to find the elder former enslaved “Simon” (L. Peter Callender) tending the home, waiting for his master’s return. The two men are joined by another returning son, “John” (Tobie Windham). It is the season to remember the Jewry’s liberation from slavery with the Seder meal to mark Passover, which is actually April 3, 2013 this year. The irony of the situation is not lost on the three Jewish characters either especially John, who is young, smart and inquisitive.
John reads a lot and loves books, even though if caught that meant a visit to the Whipping Man, an ordeal one does not want to experience, let alone witness. The scars to John’s body remain long after the physical wounds heal. And so the play meanders along, each man holding his council and with the silence secrets which spill out like a sieve in a conclusion one doesn’t expect, even if one can imagine. It is interesting thinking about enslaved Jews, but then enslaved Christians are an anomaly as well philosophically when one thinks about why a free man would carry anything from the old world into the new, but Simon thought he knew his former owner. The duplicity of the men who dare own another man, what that does to their souls is evident in “Whipping Man.” We never see the owner, yet his spirit hangs like a shroud over any happiness the three, especially John or Caleb can hope to expect. I interviewed Tobie on my radio show a few weeks ago about the role and the run in West Virginia historically not far from where the play is set. We also talk about “Django,” the film. I read the play, but haven’t seen it at this writing. Tobie’s interview closes the show: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/wandas-picks/2013/03/27/wandas-picks-radio-show “The Whipping Man” by Matthew Lopez is at Marin Theatre Company through April 21. Visit http://marintheatre.org/
Mental
Mental directed by P.J. Hogan, Australian director known for Muriel’s Wedding and My Best Friend’s Wedding and Confessions of a Shopaholic, looks at sanity and how those within the asylum are often more sane than their keepers. This is not a new premise—One Flew over a Cuckoo’s Nest is a classic in such genre. What makes this story about a white suburbia worth a second glance is how Shaz (actress Toni Collette) puts it all in perspective. Well known both in and outside the mental hospital, the new nanny treats her charges to a romp through Australian history founded as not just a penal colony, but one where the mentally ill were also dumped.
The Aussies come by their craziness naturally the girls soon learn, as they climb a mountain one night with Shaz.
The five girls’ father looks a lot like George W. Bush and the mother (actress Rebecca Gibney) who loses herself in the fantasy of the Family Von Trapp in the Sound of Music teaches us that sometimes a musical fantasy is just what the doctor ordered, that and Prozac (smile). Mental is about political corruption, philandering, loss and reclaimed identities. There is also an element of payback plus lots of suspense and laughs here as well. It opened March 29 at Sundance Kabuki in San Francisco.
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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 03 April 2013 )
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