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<\/p>\nIn 2024, not long after she was named artistic executive director of The Studio@620, Erica Sutherlin made a prophetic statement right here in the pages of the Catalyst.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Studio is 20 years this year, and we can\u2019t keep doing the same thing for 20 years,\u201d she said. \u201cWe have to revitalize it. We have to bring something new into the space, to push it forward.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Studio @620 is 22 now. Attentive theater-watchers will have noticed the dramatic increase in stage plays at The Studio since Sutherlin assumed the position. From bold takes on old-school classics (A Streetcar Named Desire, Julius Caesar) to contemporary thought-provokers (Cadillac Crew, Tail of the Bell, Hir) it\u2019s become a hub for restless creatives. A go-to for cutting-edge theater. Alternating, as always, with art exhibits, dance productions and more.<\/p>\n
Sutherlin herself directs the musical Passing Strange, opening Thursday (June 11) and running through Sunday. It will repeat the four-date series June 18-21.<\/p>\n
California musician and songwriter Mark Lamar Stewart, a.k.a. Stew, wrote the book and lyrics to Passing Strange, with assist on the music and arrangements from Heidi Rodewald.<\/p>\n
A New York Public Theatre production debuted Off-Broadway in 2007, with Stew co-starring, and Passing Strange went to Broadway the following year. It won (out of seven nominations) the Tony Award for Best Book of a Musical, and a Drama Desk Award, and a New York Drama Critics Award, and an Obie.<\/p>\n
A live four member band shares the stage with seven actors to tell the story of an unnamed young man (\u201cThe Youth\u201d) embarking on a journey of self-discovery.<\/p>\n
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Erica Sutherlin<\/p>\n
The songs, including rock \u2018n\u2019 roll, soul, punk, blues and more, are organically interspersed with the dialogue. They add to and interrupt one another. \u201cThe songs,\u201d Sutherlin points out, \u201care part of the storytelling. Stew\u2019s character is the narrator, and he tells the story using music, and using rhythm.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe was asked in an interview if it was autobiographical. He said there are some real things that occurred in this story, but as all writers know, writing about yourself isn\u2019t interesting. So it is a kernel of his journey, his young adult journey.\u201d<\/p>\n
It could be anyone\u2019s journey, fraught with self-doubt, dead ends and wrong choices. \u201cIt\u2019s about taking this journey with this young boy, across the pond to Europe, as he searches for his identity,\u201d she explains. \u201cWho he is. The \u2018real.\u2019 As we all have done in our youth, when we want to get away from home and see the world, when we think our parents aren\u2019t cool any more.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnd the parents having to let that child go and become a young adults, that process, and what that detachment feels like. And then the child wanting to find their own voice. Their own tribe.\u201d<\/p>\n
It\u2019s not only a non-traditional musical structure. Passing Strange upends the oft-used theatrical arc of Black youth, in that the protagonist is not trying to escape an urban nightmare of poverty and abuse.<\/p>\n
He just wants to see what else is out there.<\/p>\n
\u201cI really love that I get to tell a story about a young Black boy that grew up in Middle Class America. And there\u2019s not a lot of stories being produced that talk about that. We\u2019re not investigating his pain, his trauma \u2013 we\u2019re just really dealing with what it\u2019s like to be this person.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt moments he feels like he\u2019s not enough. He\u2019s not Black enough for some people. He\u2019s not \u2018this enough,\u2019 for another group. And so, \u2018Who am I?\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s just another aspect of life. It\u2019s another aspect of Black American life. And I think that\u2019s the journey, and the conversations and the questions I want to wrap around.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not screaming, in your face rock energy all the time. It\u2019s not that. If I don\u2019t get the story across, then I didn\u2019t do my job.\u201d<\/p>\n
The actors\/singers are Jacob Smith as the Narrator, Andre \u201cShacar\u201d Smith as The Youth, along with Patrick Arthur Jackson, Olivia Neal, Janesia Kelly, Ariel Blue and Troy Brooks.<\/p>\n
The band consists of Latoya McCormick, keyboards; Charlie Jacobson, guitar; Alax Braman, bass; and Andrew Deeb, drums.<\/p>\n
Passing Strange dovetails nicely with Sutherlin\u2019s stated desire to up the creative ante at The Studio@620.<\/p>\n
Still, she concedes, she\u2019s not one to pat herself on the back.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m happy with where we are, but we still have other places to go,\u201d Sutherlin says. \u201cThere are some things coming in the pipeline. We\u2019re shaping out this space \u2013 who is this studio, how does it survive, how do we remain sustainable?<\/p>\n
\u201cBut I do love where we are, with the art, the events and the theater, and we\u2019re just going to keep digging in and enriching those things.\u201d<\/p>\n