Resistance

Written by Golden Globe award-winning actress and playwright, Regina Taylor ("Crowns"), "Resistance" is a series of short plays that tackle a range of topics, from LGBTQ rights to gun rights to voting, to the 13th amendment's tie to modern slavery and the prison system. These diverse plays take an unflinching look at our current social political terrain.

This project is made possible through grant support from the Minority Arts and Education Fund (MAEF), a program of the Cleveland Foundation.

"Resistance" is made up of the following 6 short works:

DEJA VU
As 101-year old Pearl waits her turn to cast her ballot she recalls her participating in the marches for the Voting Rights Act, Pearl has a hard time figuring if she stands in the past or present as things seem painfully familiar in the age of MAGA.

JIM JOHNSON
Real life Jim Johnson was a janitor at Princeton University. One of the students recognize him as a runaway slave. Johnson had the right to contest his being dragged back down south into slavery by fighting his identity. He lost the case but the town "bought" him from his owner. Johnson had to pay off the debt. He lived to see the passage of the 13th amendment which abolished slavery except in the case of imprisonment. Under this law - Johnson's descendants remain slaves to this day.

BITING THE BULLET
Maya and Harold share the memory of the death of their son by gun violence. They do not share the same opinions on gun control laws.

ANY OTHER NAME
On the eve of the birth of their first child - Serena and Cynthia can't agree on the name of their first child: Penelope... which has a safe and traditional family history and meaning to one... or Dragon Planet Boxer which is fierce and in your face to the other, who doesn't want her child to ever feel that she has to hide. As their child listens to her parents stories, she readies herself to take on the names that the world might give her even before she takes her first breath.

MARS
The devastation of global warming has passed the point of no return. People are lining up to buy a one way ticket to Mars. Mars is a planet named after a god of war and has its own thoughts about being colonized.

HEADRAG
A centenarian African American woman is getting ready for God to land on earth in a spaceship and carry her home. She believes that God must look like her since no one sees her/hears her and treats her like a foreign body.

ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT:
Regina Taylor (PLAYWRIGHT) is an actor, director and playwright. Playwriting credits include: “Bread” (Edgerton Award. Water Tower Theater), “Crowns” (four Helen Hayes awards, including Best Director), "Oo-Bla-Dee," (Steinberg-ATCA award) and "Drowning Crow," (Broadway, MTC), “The Trinity River Plays” (Edgerton Foundation Award) and “stop.reset” (Signature Theater Residency Five).

Ms. Taylor received the Denzel Washington Endowed Chair Fordham University at Lincoln Center. An Artistic Associate of Goodman Theatre, Taylor is its most produced playwright. Signature Theater residency five playwright.

Taylor in her TV role as Lily Harper in "I'll Fly Away” received a Golden Globe Award for Best Performance by an Actress, 3 NAACP Image Awards and two Emmy Award nominations. Her other television roles include “The Unit”. Taylor was first African American lead in Masterpiece Theatre’s "Cora Unashamed," starred as Anita Hill in HBO’s “Strange Justice” and “A Good Day to Die” starring Sidney Poitier. She has co-starred in USA Networks’ Dig and guest starred in “Elementary” and “The Black List”. Next year Taylor is featured in Netflix’ One Day and a Night starring Jeffrey Wright, Ashton Saunders and directed/written by Joe Robert Cole (writer: Black Panther) and guest stars on Red Line (Producer Ava DuVernay for CBS).

Taylor’s film credits include “Saturday Church”, "The Negotiator," "Courage Under Fire," "Clockers," and "Lean on Me." Taylor was also the first Black woman to play Juliet in "Romeo and Juliet" on Broadway.