What would you sacrifice to pursue your dream?
This is the question that the women in “By The Way, Meet Vera Stark,” Duke Theater Studies’ Fall 2024 Mainstage production, must grapple with as they struggle to forge careers as actors in 1930s Hollywood.
Breaking into the movie business is challenging under any circumstances, but it was particularly difficult for Black actors in the early 20th century. The compromises they had to make, and the consequences of their choices, are deftly illustrated in Lynn Nottage’s play, directed by artist-in-residence Angelisa Gillyard.
Nottage is one of Gillyard’s favorite playwrights. Although this is her first time directing “By The Way, Meet Vera Stark,” which premiered in New York in 2011, Gillyard has previously directed Nottage’s Pulitzer Prize-winning “Sweat” at the Keegan Theatre in Washington, DC.
“By The Way, Meet Vera Stark” takes place across three time periods. The first act is set in 1933, while the second act alternates between 1973 and 2003. Gillyard finds Nottage’s experimentation with time to be an intriguing aspect of the play. “The form, where Act One and Act Two are so drastically different in time period, is very different from what you would typically see,” she said. “There’s a dynamic of looking back through history and seeing that play out on stage.”
Portraying characters at such drastically different points in their lives is also a potent challenge for the student actors. “Playing the same character over time is difficult as a young person, because you don't know what it's like to be older,” Gillyard said. “Once you're older, you can look back and say, ‘Oh, this is the difference from when I was young versus now.’ But young actors don't have that lived-in experience, so everything is imagined. I've seen professional actors with lots of credits struggle with playing the same character at two very different stages of life.”
Despite the serious and sometimes heart-wrenching situations Nottage places her characters in, “By The Way, Meet Vera Stark” is — almost unbelievably — a comedy. “I love Lynn's sense of humor, and I love how she uses humor to really comment on systems and oppression, and the people who get subjected to them,” Gillyard said.
“At its core, this play is about four women of color, four Black women, who are pursuing their dreams in the movie industry, and each one of them is doing it the best way that they know how.”
To prepare for their roles, Gillyard asked the students to read about Dona Drake (1914-1989), an actor of mixed Black and white heritage who portrayed herself as Latina in order to access roles she might otherwise have been denied. They also watched videos about Butterfly McQueen (1911-1995) and Hattie McDaniel (1893-1952), who was the first African American to win an Academy Award® for her controversial role in “Gone With The Wind” (1939).
Gillyard believes this backgrounding helped the students understand why Nottage’s characters make the choices they do, and why Vera in particular becomes pigeonholed in certain types of roles.
“Vera is ambitious,” Gillyard said. “She wants to be in this movie. We see her with the scripts a lot, looking at lines, analyzing character, looking at everything.
“She's a very skilled actor and she knows she's good. She knows that this movie is her moment, and she thinks, ‘I have to step into it, otherwise it likely won't come again.’ How often do we feel our moment coming and then we shrink back out of fear? Or do we decide, like Vera, to step into it?”
Gillyard hopes the audience will question the way we often look back and judge the choices of those who came before us, and even why we feel the need to judge them.
“When you have limited options, the choices you make are not necessarily going to be the best for you,” she said. “Maybe you wouldn't make the same choices today.
“I hope the audience sees that these are four women chasing their dreams. I hope the audience also considers how we evaluate a person’s choices when they’re forced to play in a system they didn't create.”
By The Way, Meet Vera Stark
by Lynn Nottage
Directed by Angelisa Gillyard
November 14 - 16 and 21 - 23 at 8 p.m.
November 17 at 2 p.m.
Sheafer Lab Theater, Bryan University Center
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