In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

5. The Harlem Experimental Theatre Regina’s participation in the little theater movement began with her involvement with the theater company founded by her friend W. E. B. Du Bois. Sometime during 1924, Du Bois contacted Supervising Librarian Ernestine Rose and asked for permission to use the basement of the 135th Street Branch for a theater group, named the CRIGWA Players.1 CRIGWA stood for Crisis Guild of Writers and Artists named after the Crisis journal. Later the group’s name was changed to the KRIGWA Players. Du Bois wanted to use the basement stage to produce “three or four plays in 1926 and from four to six plays in 1927.” Both Regina and her husband Bill were members of the KRIGWA Players board. Du Bois’s often-quoted philosophy about the KRIGWA was the following: [T]he plays of a Negro theatre must be: 1. About us. That is, they must have plots which reveal Negro life as it is. 2. By us. That is, they must be written by Negro authors who understand from birth and continued association just what it means to be a Negro today. 3. For us. That is, the theatre must cater primarily to Negro audiences and be supported and sustained by their entertainment and approval. 4. Near us. The theatre must be in a Negro neighborhood near the mass of ordinary Negro people.2 The creation of the KRIGWA Players and other little theaters throughout the nation was a response to plays that portrayed African Americans in a negative light as ignorant, shuffling, inarticulate caricatures. To add insult to injury, African American characters were often portrayed by white actors in blackface. Regina’s husband Bill acted in plays staged by the KRIGWA Players. He played Sam in performances of The Broken Banjo in May 1926. Six years later, 62 chapter 5 noted thespian Rose McClendon directed him in a Broadway play about a lynching, Never No More. The New York Amsterdam News review stated that he was “surprisingly excellent as Joe.”3 McClendon would later become involved in Regina’s theater company. Several months later, Bill performed in the production of the play Bloodstream about escaped convicts in a Times Square theater. The reviewer didn’t think much of the writing but said, “The defects of the drama, however, are supplemented by the unusually fine acting of a superior cast. . . . William Andrews and Ernest Whitman turn in memorable performances.”4 Regina would later act on the stage too. The relationship between Du Bois’s KRIGWA Players and the 135th Street Branch ended on a sour note. In a series of increasingly contentious notes from Du Bois to librarian Ernestine Rose and, in her absence, to her assistant Eliza Buckner Marquess, Du Bois expressed unhappiness with keeping the KRIGWA players housed in the library branch. Earlier, in January 1927, Du Bois asked Rose to grant a theater group, the Sekondi Players, permission to rehearse in the basement theater in anticipation of their subsequent performances at the 135th Street Branch. Later Du Bois declared, “I feel strongly concerning the matter and if the Sekondi Players appear in the library basement I should feel that I would have to withdraw my co-operation. They are not at all up to our standard.”5 It is unclear what the nature of the dispute was between Du Bois about the Sekondi Players or what he meant by “our standard.” Perhaps Du Bois felt that the Sekondi Players’s performances were not the propaganda-type plays that he favored. Eventually, Du Bois posted an ad in the New York Amsterdam News, noting the end of the partnership between KRIGWA and the 135th Street Branch. Rose reluctantly agreed to the end of the relationship.6 There also were disputes about what to do with the profits from the performances. Du Bois wanted to put the funds back into KRIGWA productions, but actors, playwrights, and other behind-the-scenes players wanted to be financially rewarded for their contributions. It is unknown whether Regina had knowledge of this situation, and if so, what her position was on the issues. She would have had divided loyalties to her employer and friend, Du Bois. After the demise of the KRIGWA Players, several people, including Regina and actors Dorothy Peterson and Harold Jackman, met in the basement of the 135th Street Branch and discussed forming a theater group loosely modeled on KRIGWA. Peterson was a teacher, and Jackman was an actor and teacher who graduated...

Share