Chapter 4 - Drama in the Harlem Renaissance

Summary

Jonathan Shandell offers an overview of the Negro Little Theatre Movement, the twenty-year period between the 1910s and 1930s that witnessed the flourishing of small, independent theatres across the country. As Shandell notes, these theatres “took root in library auditoriums, churches, community centers, universities, and anywhere else a platform could be built and artists and audiences might gather.” This chapter spotlights a handful of these theatres – the Anita Bush Stock Company, the Ethiopian Art Theatre, the Krigwa Players, the Harlem Suitcase Company, and the Karamu Theatre of Cleveland – and discusses both their evolution and lasting impact. Along the way, Shandell chronicles the efforts of several individuals, including W. E. B. Du Bois, Alain Locke, and Charles Gilpin, who were instrumental to their creation. The chapter ends with a brief account of the Federal Theatre Project’s “Negro units” and their aesthetic similarity to African American little theatres.