\ud83c\udfad NEW! Tampa Theatre Newsletter<\/p>\n
Opening on April 17 and running through May 3, Stageworks Theatre presents Jeff Stetson\u2019s powerful drama The Meeting, an imagined encounter between Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X that explores tension, respect, and possibility between two leaders whose visions shaped history.<\/p>\n
\ud83c\udfad NEW! Tampa Theatre Newsletter<\/p>\n
\u201cI approached directing this show from an emotional place. I directed it as if this meeting actually did happen because I believe that many of us wished that this meeting would have happened,\u201d said Rory Lawrence. \u201cThis forced me to be true to the words of this script and ask the actors to go beyond themselves, to dig deep into these two powerful men and to give a believable and powerful performance.\u201d<\/p>\n
He shaped the staging to reflect distance and connection. \u201cInitially, there had to be a physical distancing. They were not friends and wouldn\u2019t be in each other\u2019s space,\u201d he said. \u201cThere are a couple of moments where I had the actors take long beats between their lines and just look at each other to build those uncomfortable moments which brought tension to the scene.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lawrence immersed himself in research to guide the actors. \u201cI read the New York Times best seller King: A Life and The Dead Are Arising. I watched documentary after documentary because I knew that if I could grab ahold of the vision that these men had, I could share that with the actors to help them in being organic and believable on stage.\u201d<\/p>\n
He sees the play\u2019s message as urgently relevant. \u201cI hope that the audience would see that if we just sit down and talk to one another, change can happen. Sit down and listen to each other, even if we disagree, something hopeful can come out of honest conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Lance Felton, portraying Malcolm X, focused on intention and restraint. \u201cHis devout focus and discipline has been the one quality of his that I\u2019ve been working towards carving out for the audience,\u201d he said. \u201cPlaying Malcolm could easily turn into shouting and being performative; I wanted to ground his fierceness with reasoning and wit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rehearsal discussions deepened his understanding of Malcolm\u2019s humanity. \u201cWhen we talked about it, I learned I\u2019m not alone in feeling this play is very relevant and necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n
Felton\u2019s long friendship with Marc Coleman, who portrays Dr. King, fuels the urgency of their onstage debate. \u201cMarc and I have been best friends since middle school and we have these debates all the time,\u201d he said. \u201cWe constantly refer to today\u2019s news and our own conversations to develop the urgency of this message.\u201d<\/p>\n
Coleman approached Dr. King by studying the man behind the speeches. \u201cI did my best to immerse myself in his works, his speeches and tried to get an idea of who Martin Luther King, the man, was,\u201d he said. \u201cStaying calm and projecting the air of calm was the most difficult part about portraying MLK because, in reality, that\u2019s what makes him so impressive.\u201d<\/p>\n
He hopes audiences leave feeling empowered. \u201cI want them to not only have a better understanding of who these two were and why what they did was so impactful, but I want them to leave feeling like they can take a stand. They can take a stand by sitting down. They can enact their will through nonviolence, not of hate, but love and compassion.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Meeting runs April 17 to May 3 at Stageworks Theatre in Tampa. Tickets are available at stageworkstheatre.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\ud83c\udfad NEW! Tampa Theatre Newsletter Get all the top news & discounts for Tampa & beyond. Opening on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":217849,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[135,137,136],"class_list":["post-217848","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-tampa","tag-tampa","tag-tampa-headlines","tag-tampa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217848","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=217848"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/217848\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/217849"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=217848"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=217848"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=217848"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}