Few know the work of playwright August Wilson quite like director Ron O.J. Parson.
In 2027, the longtime resident artist at the University of Chicago’s Court Theatre will complete Wilson’s famed “American Century Cycle” on the mainstage. The series of 10 plays—one for each decade of the 20th century—documents the breadth of Black life.
This summer, the venerable Chicago artist will step into the role of Wilson himself.
The Spotlight Reading Series, founded by Parson and director Aaron Mays in 2016, aims to resurface lesser-known and rarely produced work by primarily Black playwrights.
Over the past decade, the series has grown from play readings in community centers across the city into multi-day symposia with a dedicated following and robust slate of programming.
For its 10th anniversary, Court is celebrating the series with “A Century of Black Progress.” Ten events throughout August, including film screenings, archival workshops, book clubs and staged play readings, will nod to both the 100th anniversary of Black History Month and the imminent completion of the American Century Cycle with Joe Turner’s Come and Gone this winter.
On Aug. 12, Parson will read the role of August Wilson in his autobiographical play How I Learned What I Learned.
“This 10th anniversary series is an extension of Ron’s work to keep these plays alive, present and available to people,” said Kamilah Rashied, director of engagement at Court who now leads Spotlight. “Now, let’s take it to another level.”
All events are free and open to the public, though reservations are required.
‘People needed to hear them’
When Parson began the series with Mays, he reached back to the playwrights of his childhood: Ed Bullins, P. J. Gibson, Ntozake Shange, Ron Milner.
Their plays—experimental and bold—pushed against racist stereotypes and grappled with the complexity of the Black experience. This surge of art inspired by the struggles of the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements is known as the Black Arts Movement.
Though the average theatergoer might recognize the names August Wilson or Lorainne Hansberry, many works by Black playwrights remain noticeably absent from American stages.
“Some of these old plays and playwrights from the ‘60s and ‘70s, a lot of people today don't remember them,” Parson said. “We thought about these plays that were Black classics that needed to be done; people needed to hear them.”
For Parson, who Rashied calls “a living library of plays,” the goal of the series was not only to resurface these classics, but to bring Court Theatre directly to the community.
Starting with James Baldwin’s Blues for Mister Charlie in 2016, the series brought professional actors and directors into Chicago neighborhoods. With scripts on stands, they read Joseph A. Walker’s The River Niger in an Englewood YMCA, Alice Childress’s Trouble in Mind at the South Shore Cultural Center and Buffalo Hair by Carlyle Brown in Bronzeville.
Brown himself attended the reading.
“He came in for it because he hadn’t seen it in a while,” Parson said. “When the playwright wants to come out and be involved—can’t beat that.”
Some of Parson’s favorite moments from the past decade came from the excitement of older community members.
“They would get up and say: I remember when that came here; I remember when that was over at the Regal,” Parson said. “It just rejuvenated that room.”
‘A life all its own’
Though Rashied attended a prestigious drama program, the first time she’d ever heard of playwrights Pearl Cleage or Ntozake Shange was from her peers.
“I was furious,” she said. “I expected to have a well-rounded education, and I didn't.”
This lack of representation has been “a perpetual thorn” in her creative and professional life ever since. When Rashied overhauled Court’s community programming a few years ago, she decided to make Spotlight a cornerstone.
“For me, [the series] feels like the education I never got,” she said.
To better accommodate the series’ growing popularity—with guidance from its founders—Rashied expanded the series to an annual three-day summer symposium held in Hyde Park.
“Hosting symposia is what academics and art historians do to venerate, commemorate and discuss the significance of artists,” Rashied said. “Changing the series to a symposium was signaling that this Black intelligence needs to be canonized and taken as seriously as Shakespeare.”
This year’s 10th-anniversary festival will kick off on Aug. 7 with a film screening of Black films in partnership with UChicago's Film Studies Center.
In addition to Parson’s turn as Wilson, staged play readings will include “A Womanist Trilogy” of Black feminist plays: Color Struck (1925) by Zora Neale Hurston, A Black Woman Speaks (1950) by Beah Richards and She Talks to Beethoven (1989) by Adrienne Kennedy.
Rounding out the century will be a reading of the recently produced are you ready to smash white things? by Chicago playwright Ireon Roach, presented in partnership with Definition Theatre.
In partnership with Chicago Public Library, the festival will also host several events at local branches. At Harold Washington Library, participants can step into the Black Arts Movement with an exclusive peek into the archives of the Kuumba Theatre Company. At the Woodson Regional branch, participants can explore the Vivian G. Harsh collection and discuss Gwendolyn Brooks’s debut poetry collection, A Street in Bronzeville (1945). At the Blackstone Branch, they can join a book club discussion on Chicago’s theater and dance history.
The festival will culminate with an afternoon of roundtable discussions about Black authorship and placemaking in collaboration with UChicago’s Arts and Public Life.
As for the future, Rashied and Parson hope the plays highlighted by the series can eventually be produced as full-blown productions on Court’s mainstage. Though the series has steadily grown more popular and diverse, the team still hopes to reach new audience members, especially young people.
“For me, Spotlight feels like a family reunion, a little bit of a homecoming,” Rashied said. “It has a life all its own now, which was really the goal.”
