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There is another
“monologue” style play with a social message, Keep on Dancing, written
and performed at Metropolitan State
University (Minneapolis,
Mn) by Jemal Everett
(2000). The short-subject-length
script reads like a poem in Ebonics, or the poor “black” talk in the South in
the Depression 1930’s. The protagonist escapes his inferior social status,
segregation and servitude if he performs for others, “keeps on dancing.” Is this a good reason to become a performer
or an actor? He could have almost
named the play “I Be Dancing” and the title would work. The musical verse,
sometimes close to rhyming, is filled with unusual metaphors and similes in
simple talk, like “I’m sugar or I’m shit.”
It’s a good example of colorful poetic writing in a minority cultural
dialect. And there is plenty of dancing, but little complaining.
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