PHILADELPHIA (WPVI) — “FIRE!!” is one hot production, featuring music, dancing and poetry at Mt. Airy’s historic Sedgwick Theatre.
“It is inspired by the work of Wallace Thurman, Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston,” says Raelle Myrick-Hodges, Director of “FIRE!!”. “From the Harlem Renaissance.”
In 1926, those writers and other artists published a groundbreaking magazine called “FIRE!! Devoted to Younger Negro Artists”.
“‘FIRE!!’ was the name of the magazine, but the irony was there was never another one because all of those issues were burned in a fire,” she says. “Someone burned down the building.”
The play weaves together the lives of the legendary artists.
“With the fictional premise that they are putting on a gala for the evening,” she says. “They needed to raise money for their next issue.”
During the gala, they perform excerpts from essays published in the first issue of the magazine.
“We have a live band,” she says. “There’s a ton of music in it, great choreography in it and all of the text is by some of the greatest American writers of the last century.”
Myrick-Hodges calls it “a Philly story.”
“Half the writers in it are from here,” she says.
There are 11 artists in the ensemble.
“Gwendolyn Bennett is a woman who does it all,” says actress Taylor J. Mitchell who’s cast in the role.
Bennett was one of the magazine’s editors.
“She wrote ‘Wedding Day’ while she was in Paris on scholarship, just studying art a bit more, and it talks about interracial marriage,” she says.
“I play Richard Bruce Nugent. He is one of the editors as well,” says actor Charlie Barney.
“He was of mixed heritage, and he was queer,” says Myrick-Hodges. “There would be no James Baldwin without Richard Bruce Nugent.”
The play uplifts some of the pioneering voices from the Harlem Renaissance.
“Not only do we want to honor their legacy and their family, we also want people to come to this show and immediately go home and Google their work,” says Mitchell.
“It is imperative for young artists to commune and make work together,” says Myrick-Hodges. “It is the celebration of how we make and how we get to see ourselves.”
Quintessence Theatre Group is presenting “FIRE!!” through November 2 at the Sedgwick Theatre.
For more information:
Quintessence Theatre Group – “FIRE!!”
Link to Tickets at the Sedgwick Theatre
The Sedgwick Theatre
7137 Germantown Ave.
Philadelphia, PA 19119
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