Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen offers a viewing tip for the coming week. Writer/producer/director Rick Sebak’s latest installment in WQED-TV’s “Pittsburgh History Series” revisits a 32-year-old interview with the late Pittsburgh native and playwright August Wilson. Premiering at 8 p.m. Thursday on WQED, “Brain Space & Energy: My
PBS’s Independent Lens to Premiere Mr. SOUL!Bringing America’s First Black Variety Show Back to Public TelevisionDocumentary Illuminates Groundbreaking Show SOUL! and Its Trailblazing Producer
Milwaukee Repâs âCelebration of Black History Monthâ
Image via Milwaukee Rep
Every February, we celebrate Black History Month to recognize the achievements and contributions of Black people as well as work toward understanding the effects of racism. The Milwaukee Repertory Theater is presenting âWe Rise: MKEâs Celebration of Black History Monthâ with four, free virtual events that honor the contributions made by Black artists to American theater.Â
ââWe Riseâ celebrates the past, present, and the hope of the future,â says Associate Artistic Producer Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj. âEach event will not only be informative and entertaining, but, I hope, will inspire in every American that African American history is American history.âÂ
The Atlantic
Two new Netflix films,
Giving Voice, honor the late playwright’s rejection of white commercial restrictions.
December 22, 2020
“Do we assimilate into American society and thereby lose our culture, or do we maintain our culture separate from the dominant cultural values? August WilsonTom Sweeney / Minneapolis Star Tribune / ZUMA Press / Alamy
It’s a glorious moment for devotees of the late, great playwright August Wilson, even with many theaters closed. Netflix has two new Wilson films on offer: a swift, sumptuous version of
Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom and the heartening documentary
Giving Voice, about high-school students who discover the thrill and resonance of Wilson’s characters while preparing for a national monologue competition. Together, the films reflect not only on the achievement of Wilson’s American Century Cycle his 10-play chronicle of Black life in America through each decade of the 20th century but also on his long-running battle with