InterAct Theatre Company: Talking With Frank Higgins

Talking With... Frank Higgins

Playwright of BLACK PEARL SINGS!

Conducted by Rebecca Wright, InterAct's Literary Director & Dramaturg,
and Sara Orr, Literary Intern

InterAct: While BLACK PEARL SINGS! is set during the Great Depression, it feels very resonant to our world today. Can you talk a little about how you see the story of this play relating to the world of 2010?

Also, the issue of who is qualified to tell whose stories is an emotionally explosive subject. BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE is a wonderful play that deals with that issue in a different context. [Ed. note: BEE-LUTHER-HATCHEE is written by InterAct's Playwright-In-Residence Thomas Gibbons.] BLACK PEARL SINGS! asks the question, what is authentic and what isn't? Does studying folklore somehow change the thing that one is observing? What if 'authentic' isn't flattering? And also what myths - not 'myth' in the sense of a mistaken belief - do we need in order to help us live our lives?

InterAct: What drew you to these questions of authenticity?

Frank Higgins: I’ve always been fascinated by what’s ‘culturally authentic’ and what isn’t. This can become an explosive topic. Is a white person wearing a dashiki - or Indian jewelry - honoring a different culture or appropriating it? Is there a tendency that many people of all backgrounds have to Romanticize their cultural past and the pasts of others? I recall cringing in high school when my Spanish teacher asked an exchange student from Mexico to visit our class, "and wear one of your native costumes." Should Muslim women be free to wear scarves over their heads in school because it is culturally authentic and part of their religion? Should a white kid be able to wear a do-rag on his head that is the Confederate Stars and Bars as long as his ancestry is authentically Southern? Can a male student who is Jewish wear a yarmulke to school? If so, can a boy who is Wiccan wear whatever Wiccans wear? Are the questions more provocative than the answers?

InterAct: In BLACK PEARL SINGS! these questions of cultural heritage come about largely in relation to the songs: what does it mean to own something, to own something that is immaterial, like a song, to feel cultural claim on an idea, or a bit of history, or a piece of music? Do you come down on one side of this debate?

Frank Higgins: I don’t know exactly what my beliefs on these things are, which is probably why I wrote the play: to find out. I’m still in the process of that.

InterAct: What kind of research did you do in preparation to write this play? What was your process for picking the songs used in the play?

Frank Higgins: When I was researching the music for my play WMKS: WHERE MUSIC KILLS SORROW, I came across some of the songs that several years later would go into BLACK PEARL SINGS! I tried to pick a variety of songs, some well known and some not. The well-known songs are sung in versions that most people have not heard, but are based on early field recordings. We hear “Down On Me” and “Kum Ba Yah”, for example, in their early - and better - versions. (I disliked the folksy “Cumbaya” that we’ve all heard; but the old time African-influenced version from the Georgia and South Carolina Sea Islands is magical). Along with a couple of songs that become well known, I thought the show needed a couple of songs that fewer people would know. There needed to be songs from the Southern Mountains, which the Susannah character is an expert on. The song she sings in the last scene, “Six Feet of Earth,” rocks me back in my seat through its simplicity. The African song is an actual song that came to America from the Mende people of the Sierra Leone area. If one is interested, there is a fascinating one hour documentary film about the song called The Language You Cry In that is worth a look. You won't find it at a video story or Netflix, but a library might have it.

InterAct: The story of Pearl and Susannah is drawn from the real life story of Huddie Ledbetter, best known as folk and blues singer/musician Leadbelly, and John Lomax. What drew you to Leadbelly and Lomax? And what guided your decisions about what to mirror and what to alter?

Frank Higgins: I was interested in the Leadbelly/Lomax story but I didn’t want to get tied into a bio-drama. I found Leadbelly and Lomax intriguing for a number of reasons: Lomax’s goal of recording the music of ‘common people’ was a great goal. Lomax’s racial views were not great, or enlightened. And when the two came to NYC in the 30’s, Lomax in fact had Leadbelly perform at first in prison stripes. But Lomax never seems to have considered that there might be an African song that came to America on the slave ships that might still exist. When I discovered the actual African song that appears in BLACK PEARL SINGS!, I realized why I never tried to write the Lomax/Leadbelly play before. Susannah, the song collector in BLACK PEARL SINGS!, is convinced that there might still be a surviving African song from pre-slavery times, but the clock is ticking, and she must find it before the people die off. I decided to use female characters because it was more likely that a song would be passed on from one generation to the next in a matriarchal situation.

InterAct: In what ways do you see Susannah and Pearl’s relationship as emblematic of the classic white manager/black artist relationship?

Frank Higgins: Susannah knows the business, cultural and academic world that they are trying to woo. The play implies that Pearl is learning how to think big in these ways from observing Susannah. In today's world one increasingly sees black stars - particularly music stars - being knowledgeable about many aspects of business. P. Diddy expands from being a recording artist to owning a recording label, and then marketing clothes and cologne. Beyoncé does some of the same things. Oprah goes from talk show host to producer of family films and TV dramas. The key is leverage. Pearl is not in a position yet to have much leverage, but she is learning how to use it if she gets it.

InterAct: BLACK PEARL SINGS! has had many productions all across the country, and yet you’ve continued to revise it after each production. Tell us a little bit about your process. What is it like as a playwright to see your own work performed, and what is it about this experience that motivates you to keep working on the piece?

Frank Higgins: In the first couple of productions an actress became ill and missed much of the rehearsal period. The consequence of that is the rest of rehearsal becomes a scramble just to get things on its feet. As a result, I’m still finding and making discoveries about the characters and the play. It's a challenging and sometimes frustrating process. The risk is that as the time period grows, one inevitably starts to change somehow as a person. Whoever I am now, I'm different - at least a little bit - from who I was when I wrote the original draft of the play.

InterAct: What are you working on now? What’s next for you?

Frank Higgins: I’m working on a play set in the hills of western North Carolina, and it deals with music.

InterAct: Well good luck with the new script and thanks for taking the time to talk with us.

THE 2009/2010 SEASON

Introduction

Chad Deity

City of Numbers

When We Go Upon The Sea

Black Pearl Sings!

Make a Purchase

About The Play

Running Time

The Playwright

Playwright Interview

The Director

The Cast

Talk-Backs

Calendar