Artistic Director Statement
Earth, Water, Flight, and Fire

Earth & Water
“Sure with global warming and the melting ice caps, we’re going to need [gills]. I’m just trying to stay one step ahead of the evolutionary curve.”
-Excerpt from Aurin's Submerged From All Sides...

How does one come to a healthy sexual identity in a society that can’t seem to make up its mind whether it is sex-phobic or sex-positive? In Aurin’s new play, water is an element that he draws on to answer these questions and evoke memory of an adolescent life being submerged. The more we explore and inhabit water, Aurin dramatically argues, the better chance our society has at evolving into a thoughtful people with regards to sex and sexuality identity.

Sharon's non-linear, jazz theatre form knows multiple elements. She began creating delta dandi with the intention that it would be a celebration of Black culture and jazz. And while the latest incarnation of delta dandi employs Sharon’s signature poetic voice and her new work is still informed by herstories and histories, the spirits of the Mississippi Delta and spirits from across the Diaspora had something different in mind for her to create.

Flight
The promise of Harrison's theatre is how he tackles misunderstood ideas and layers his work with social relevance. And in his plays that I am familiar with, he does this while deftly employing imagery of flight.

Flight. Our civilization is fascinated by what's above: winged creatures, steel structures, and unidentifiable objects... upward mobility, penthouses, and metro-area north side suburban enclaves. There is something about what is above us that pulls our attention to it as if it were all a part of some sort of unstoppable gravitational force. The cynical part of me wonders why it is easier to be drawn to what is above than to be drawn to what is below: the homeless person on Canal Street, soaring HIV/AIDS rates in Black communities in the U.S. (not just in Africa!!), Earth’s shrinking south pole. What I find most exciting about Harrison's work is his knack for picking up the shit everybody's been stepping on and throwing it in the air saying: Ain't that something too?

Fire
At Freedom Train Productions, fire not only describes the theatre work that we do--passionate, dynamic, critical--but it is also an essential element of the structures behind our work.

The Train is changing -- in a good way. In the summer of 2008, we were awarded an Union Square Arts Award, a two-year $35K grant. This award has allowed us to take several bold steps forward. In 2010, we will stage our first full production. This change will be visible to supporters and audience members of The Train. Internally we will take bold steps too. Keeping in line with our political theatre and social justice vision we have begun designing a long term plan that entails paying all of our artists and staff equitably -- avoiding a common not-for-profit/theatre paradigm of 4 development staff per every 1 core artist.

We will not acquiesce into critical artists who run standard institutions. The path ahead will not be without challenge, but with the strength and intention of our artistic and social justice fire and community championship from supporters like you, the challenges ahead will not be insurmountable.

Light,

Andre Lancaster, Artistic & Managing Director

Play Development Process