Obsidian Theatre: Regathering The Diaspora - creation and objectives of Obsidian Theatre Company

FOR MANY REGULARS, THEATRE-GONG IS CONSIDERED AN OCCASION FOR PURE ENTERTAINMENT. THEIR PRESENCE IN THE theatre is for unqualified merriment; they leave their worries behind. But for conscious people of African descent, theatre is an institution of empowerment. It is one place where constituents from that community experience stories with which they can identify.

Theatre is a spiritual tool for African peoples with which to communicate ideas, where people can get healing and get inspired and where people can begin to think beyond the immediate and start to invest something in the future of the children. For African Canadians, such spiritual enrichment has been as evasive as trying to hold an ochro seed in a china bowl. Indications are, things are changing.

In 1999 Satoori Shakoor, an American theatre artist living in Toronto, fell in love with a play called Nevis Mountain Dew by Steve Carter. It's about a West Indian family living in Queens, New York. The play captures the family's struggles to get along in an unfamiliar place. Shakoor wanted to play a part in it, but as she looked around Toronto it became evident that, despite the wealth of extraordinary talent, there was an absence of the Black rhythm, energies, aesthetic and secrets onstage that were necessary for the project to be an outstanding success.

Shakoor settled for a reading of Nevis Mountain Dew. Over dinner one night, discussion developed about funding possibilities. She discovered in the process that the experience of people from the African diaspora is not taken seriously by Canadian funding agencies. In her search for resources to produce Nevis Mountain Dew she was told continuously that type of play wasn't in their mandate. She was amazed!

As an African American accustomed to having a common linkage among her peers, she missed that type of embracing here in multicultural Toronto. This concern made Shakoor realize there was no political voice for African Canadians. They are almost invisible. One other troubling situation she confronted was friction between the cultural groups. These ingredients provided a natural foundation for establishing a theatre for African Canadians.

In August of 1999 the first meeting took place at the home of Kim Roberts, a popular Toronto actress. The people who assembled with their hopes and dreams to give birth to this new theatre were Alison Sealy-Smith, Djanet Sears, Sandi Ross, Yanna McIntosh, Ardon Bess, Tricia Williams, Awaovieyi Agie, Philip Akin, David Collin, Dianne Roberts, Roy Lewis, Kim Roberts and Shakoor.

The feeling in the room that first night was extraordinary as the monumental united will just happened. Support in the community was extremely positive. All the volunteers engaged in the project felt it was the right time. They knew they just had to ride this wave of support and make sure that they put down the kind of roots that will attract ongoing support. And thus a new Canadian theatre named Obsidian was born.

Finding a name for the company was not easy. Quite naturally, as the founding members are from different parts of the globe, their diverse cultural backgrounds can be considered a microcosm of the city of Toronto. That posed a challenge in naming the institution.

Obsidian is a name taken from a black, reflective, ancient rock that comes from the centre of the earth. "I like the idea that there is something Black that you could see yourself in, which is something that we haven't had so far," smiles Obsidian artistic director Alison Sealy-Smith. As her people always seem to be looking at themselves through somebody else's lens, the veteran actress concludes "It's about time we see our own reflection."

The first season is scheduled for spring 2001. The Piano Lesson by August Wilson and Old Story Time by Trevor Rhone are being considered for production at the du Maurier Theatre at Harbourfront Centre, which seats 400. Determined to keep the theatre on track to serve their community, this body of creative people is pooling its skills to undertake early and necessary chores. In the absence of upfront dollars, they literally have to become magicians to realize their dreams.

Sandi Ross is acting as general manager of the company. A past president of ACTRA Toronto and an experienced actor, she brings good political and corporate contacts. Ross sits on the Laidlaw Performing Arts Committee and the Canada Council Racial Equity Committee, and advocates for her people at union conventions and community assemblies. Until everything is in place the theatre is operating out of her home.

Right now, as artistic director, Sealy-Smith is really focused on getting the theatre going. She is assiduously building a national and international network of theatre companies. "Obsidian is not a novelty item, it is not a flavour of the month. I think we can prove that and I know a lot will ride on the work that we do," she affirms.

A flying squad grant for $5,000 from the Canada Council allows the company the freedom to bring in specialist consultants for two-play seasons. Annual operations will cost approximately $500,000. However, co-productions with good partners are going to be a big feature of functions. Far East Theatre in Halifax, and others in Winnipeg and the U.S. are in line for co-productions when Obsidian gets into high gear.

As they grow together as a company and as individuals, it's pretty exciting. Aside from the fact that this theatre company will be changing and enriching the tapestry here in this country, the thirteen founding members represent diverse cultures from within the African diaspora. They are mindful that the group includes artists born in Toronto; some are from western Canada; there are easterners and Americans who have been living here for quite a while and, quite naturally, there are new arrivals. The founding group includes people from Nigeria, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Jamaica, Barbados, England, Detroit, St. Paul, Minneapolis, Winnipeg, Oshawa and Toronto.

So, along with other challenges, Obsidian is trying to overcome the traditional challenge of unity. They admit not being able to represent everyone, but it is proudly noted that this is a group of people who provide the broadest representation of the African diaspora. Irrespective of their colour, they are trying to leap that hurdle of insularity to stop fighting and stop compartmentalizing themselves. It is safe to say that the diaspora has emissaries, and that is pleasing to Sealy-Smith, who is praying that "we don't break down and get tribal."

Ross outlines the scope of the company when she describes them "coming together, acknowledging that we come from this broad spectrum, then acknowledging that we haven't seen a Wole Soyinka play in Toronto, certainly not in the last fifteen years. We haven't seen an August Wilson play. We haven't seen a Derek Walcott play, so therefore you start saying 'Excuse me, I want to do this play from Africa. I want to do this play from Trinidad. I want to do this play from the States. I want to do Shakespeare. I want to do a play by Alexander Dumas, a Black man in France.' So please, our world is much larger than the world of the traditional Caucasian theatre."

Ghettoization is a term which members of Obsidian have been asked to address by journalists from mainstream media. The journalists were troubled with the idea of Obsidian being exclusive. Well, the thought is an enraging one, so Sealy-Smith counters "that is so strange. When White companies get together that is not a concern."

She wants to know whether this kind of question was posed to when the Toronto-based Soulpepper repertory company got together. Members of that outfit are all White and they all went to school in the same place. "Nobody accuses them of ghettoization. Twelve Black people in a room, and we are being exclusive," marvels Sealy-Smith.

Combined with the concern of exclusivity, the organizers are being asked what is their target audience. "Our target audience is people who want to see great theatre. And we are being asked 'Are there enough Black people in Toronto to see this theatre?' Yeah. Also we assume that the Toronto population, the main theatregoer, is as interested in our work as anybody else's.

"Some people I've talked to are even more interested because they keep saying 'It's about time. I can't wait for you guys to start producing.' So there is a very broad base of audience member that we are going for. Obviously we are doing stories by Black playwrights or Black actors. That does not mean we won't do European plays but with Black actors."

It is important for the Canadian public to experience how Black actors and directors interpret European literature. Many have never had that privilege. "If we chose to do Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf by Edward Albee with an all-Black cast, it's like if a story is universal then it's universal. If we choose to do The Piano Lesson by August Wilson, if the story is universal then the story is universal. You have to be able to put the two next to each other to say 'Look at good playwrights!'"

One problem that African Canadians face in their own country is that they have to deal with people who, traditionally, are familiar with operating in compartments, so they are unable to see outside of that traditional stereotypical bin. This attitude forced Sandi Ross to stop singing for fifteen years after she moved to Toronto. She was not prepared to deal with the narrow jazz or blues cubicle others were creating for her. They could not understand the breadth of her experience, which spanned a variety of areas such as Shakespeare, shows, staged plays and musicals.

For Ross this initiative is an affirmation of her usefulness on this earth. It means that she has not passed on this earth thinking only of herself. With this euphoria has come recognition of the need to have a permanent space that African Canadian artists can call their home. Efforts in the past have fizzled out. Many recall the initiatives of Vera Cudjoe with Black Theatre Canada and Jeff Henry with Theatre Fountainhead.

Although Obsidian is in its infancy, a building fund has been established in order for the founders to leave something behind so that their community does not continually rebuild the wheel; so that other theatre companies would not have to start from square one.

"Black Theatre Canada started from square one, they finally wore themselves out. Theatre Fountainhead started from square one, they finally wore themselves out. We want to make sure that there is an organization, so that when I pass from this earth, the next group of actors doesn't have to start from square one; so that our administration is tight so we don't fall down there, and so that our product is excellent," Ross reflects.

Djanet Sears, artistic director of the AfriCanadian Playwrights Festival and Conference, which was held for the first time this past April in Toronto, is careful to implore the West African proverb "the shoulders on which we stand", which acknowledges that she and her peers are here by the grace of those who have come before.

"There is a sense that theatre is a new idea for Black people, for diasporic people here and it's quite untrue," she insists.

"Sometimes we create new theatre companies, we feel though as if we are isolated, as if we are beginning something that no one has done before, that we are treading new territory. Well in fact we are not treading new territory in total," she continues.

"Really, there are some footprints in the paths where we are trying to create as if for the first time and I think those can be really sturdy shoulders for us to set our work on, even psychologically, in terms of there are those who've come before us and there are those who will come after us and we are part of a huge tradition and a wide, broad tradition of theatre."

It was for that reason that Obsidian Theatre Company's presentation last spring at the opening night of the first-ever AfriCanadian Playwrights Festival was titled "The Shoulders On Which We Stand." Members of the planning committee wanted to pay homage to those strong shoulders, and at the same time to recognize that the traditions of African peoples are not only based within these North American political borders.

"As a diasporic people we come from many places and of many ancestries, so we wanted to look at where our inspirations come from; whose work we lean on," Sears concludes.

Obsidian Theatre Company is seen as a viable vehicle for African peoples on this landscape to express who they are economically, politically, socially, everywhere. A theatre is a powerful place to communicate ideas to bring communities together which is lacking in Canada. "It's missing, it's needed and it's time!" stresses Satori Shakoor.

The vision for Obsidian is huge, exciting and compelling, with overwhelming support. In view of the fact that she approached the venture positively, Shakoor is not surprised at the encouragement the company is receiving.

"Sometimes visions or ideas are so big that you back away and you don't think the people will buy into it or support it, but when you put it out there on the court there is a different experience," she muses.

"So if we can come together with all our many different cultures and languages and experiences; if we can come together as thirteen people and create something of this enormity, then we have set an example for Black people in Toronto and maybe in the country to politicize, to organize, to come together around a common idea and maybe have a voice," sums up Shakoor.

"Because personally philosophically, I believe that the world will never come into full balance until we, as Black people, become a powerful voice on this planet," she says. "Only then will the balance on the planet be achieved."

William Doyle-Marshall is a writer/broadcaster and critic who has immersed himself in monitoring the arts on the North American scene. His provocative columns, commentaries, features and reviews have been read around the world in a number of publications and broadcast on radio. In Canada he hosts "My Data Bag", a weekly Tuesday afternoon show on CHRY Radio 105.5FM. His columns have been published in the Ghanaian News, Pride News Magazine, Metro Word Maqazine and the Jamaica Weekly Gleaner.

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