WHEN SHIT GOES DOWN, YOUR GIRLS SHOW UP

“…it’s about PEOPLE not about a color. We are BLACK. And it’s also FUN to FRAZZLE people who then have to say it.”

“…I’m not interested in writing people who are miserable and sad. I’m INTERESTED IN PEOPLE WHO RUN FROM IT, creatively, until they can’t anymore.”

In CONVERSATION with the PLAYWRIGHT

The title is quite cheeky because the Chicago-based poet AVERY R. YOUNG coined the word BLKS because it’s about people not about a color. We are Black. And it’s also fun to frazzle people who then have to say it. Say it! We’re Black people. Cuz I was in school with a bunch of very delusional neo-liberal people who would say “I just don’t see race.” To which I say, “Bitch you better! What is wrong with you?” I see it as such a fearful erasure, it’s dangerous not to see, and it’s dangerous to say it’s not your politics.

In reflecting on my own experiences to write the play I realized my friends and I are fucking funny. It’s the thing to deal with the thing. Like the laugh so you don’t cry thing. I’m not interested in writing people who are miserable and sad. I’m interested in people who run from it, creatively, until they can’t anymore. So it’s a comedy. Like shit, please let it be a comedy. People are so fucking sad, it needs to be a comedy.

As outrageous as they are, that’s the only way they deal with it. I mean if they were like “dang my boyfriend cheated on me” and “dang my dad’s dead” and “dang I don’t know what my own brain is doing…” Jesus Christ no. I think of the horrors of my life, why I felt so out of my body and mind, like the only thing that would have helped was to laugh and to put on some makeup and a wig. It’s just horrifying, and you can’t walk around being horrified all the time.