Imagine sitting in your living room and having a cup of tea with one of the most influential figures in American history.
That's what it's like to watch A Rose Among Thorns: A Tribute to Rosa Parks, a one-woman show that had its last performance at this year's National Black Theatre Festival last night at Reynolda House Museum of American Art.
Ella Joyce (Roc, My Wife & Kids, Bubba Ho-Tep) gives an inspiring and vivid performance as Parks, 42, a black seamstress whose refusal to give up her seat on an Alabama bus to a white man in 1955 sparked a boycott that led to one of the landmark cases in the civil-rights movement.
Joyce, who wrote the play and performed it at the 2007 festival, is mesmerizing as Parks. She brings warmth, humor and passion to the role, telling tales from Parks' life, clearing up many of the misconceptions about her case, and giving some fascinating insight into the woman.
She does it all in such an intimate way that you feel that you are just sitting there, having a chat with Rosa Parks.
Parks wasn't the only historical figure on stage last night. The night opened with Jim Beckwourth: The Black Mountain Man, a one-man show written by Mark Weston and performed by Michael Broughton.
Broughton gives a passionate performance as Beckwourth, a 19th-century black pioneer and trapper who ended up being accepted by the Crow Indians and eventually becoming a chief. His adventures were legendary … and sometimes discounted as mere legend. But the tales, tall or not, make for an enjoyable bit of theater.
■ Susan Gilmor can be reached at 727-7298 or sgilmor@wsjournal.com.
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