- Announcer: Funding for APT's "Out of the Woods"
is provided by
Arcadia Books,
Dane Arts,
Nancy A. McDaniel,
Orange Tree Imports,
Wilson Creek Pottery,
Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programming,
and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.
[whippoorwills singing]
[crickets chirping]
[playful classical music]
[birds warbling]
- Brenda DeVita: Hello everybody.
Welcome.
Thank you for being here tonight
for our second series of the "Out of the Woods."
And it's strange,
'cause tonight would be our closing night up the hill
and of our 2020 season.
And so it's more special that you're with us tonight.
So thank you so much for being here.
I would like to say that
I know many of you have been watching all of these readings
and I cannot tell you what it means to all of us
to share our work and be creating something in this time.
So thank you so much for being here.
If you've been with us,
and many of you have been for a long time,
you've seen the trajectory APT has taken
in the last few years
and our interest in expanding the voices and the,
and the stories that we tell at APT.
And it's important.
It's, I can't imagine anything more important right now
than our mission, which is to,
to explore what it is to be a human being,
and on this trajectory at APT,
we want to make sure that when we ask "What is a classic?"
that we're really asking that question,
what makes something a real exploration in all of us
and not just be asking what it is to be white,
a white human being, but to be a human being,
and the idea of universality.
And this series is a step in that direction
of contemplating that in a broader and more important way,
hopefully to make a more equitable theater space at APT
and in our audience,
but also, dare we say, in the world.
So thank you for being on this journey with us.
I'm excited about this series.
And tonight, specifically,
I want to say thank you to Nathan Davis,
who wrote this play.
I'm so excited to introduce his work to you,
he's a exquisite poet and playwright
and an important voice
and his aesthetic just marries so beautifully with APT.
I think you'll really enjoy tonight.
And I hope that Nathan will be joining us
for the talk back afterwards.
I have to take a moment to thank Gavin Lawrence.
You know him as an actor, extraordinary actor,
part of our core company,
and he has moved into directing with us.
He was to direct Brothers Size for us in our 2020 season.
And we are thrilled that he is directing
tonight's reading with us.
It's not a small thing to be Gavin in the core company
and in our world here at APT.
It's a lot of work and he is, does it gracefully.
And he has singly, in his own way,
changed the trajectory of APT.
And I want to thank you Gavin, as a colleague and friend,
for keeping me honest and keeping APT honest
as we move forward
and become who we're going to be in the future.
Thank you.
I also want to thank the entire creative team tonight.
The beautiful and talented La Shawn Banks,
who's playing Nat Turner tonight.
He's been with us many times on our stage.
You've seen him many times,
and most recently as Feste in Twelfth Night .
Also Nate Burger, our core company member,
wonderful actor and friend is playing two roles tonight,
Thomas Gray and the guard.
Also, thank Michael Morgan, who-- this is a very poetic text
and making it dramatic is a lot of work.
And I want to thank him for his magic
that he worked on as voice and text coach.
I also want to thank Casey Hoesktra,
who you've seen as an actor on our stage,
who is also an illustrator, and he did the illustrations
that you'll see tonight in the reading.
And Gavin Lawrence, who composed the music tonight
in the interludes.
Jacki Singleton, thank you.
Shout out to you.
You work incredibly hard to keep all of these readings going
and working backstage, backstage on the computer.
Thank you.
Also, Carey Cannon, Jake Penner, and Evelyn Matten,
the artistic team, thank you.
You are incredible and always saying yes,
as well as our staff at APT,
who never says no to the ideas we have
as we move forward through 2020.
And every time we turned around,
it's a question, and we answer it, and everyone says yes.
So thank you, thank you, thank you.
Again, I want to thank PBS Wisconsin
for partnering with us.
I can't say what 2020 would have been without you.
We appreciate your work and your commitment to us at APT
and bringing these stories to a larger audience.
These plays will be available, this series,
on PBS Wisconsin.
So keep watch for the details on that.
So you can invite your friends
and you can come back and watch the plays again.
And as always, our season sponsors
who have stuck with us over the years,
and have over the years and this summer, specifically,
as we didn't have a season,
we couldn't do our work without you.
And your confidence in us is,
is imperative for us to keep going.
So thank you so much.
And to you, our audience, we say it all the time.
You're incredible.
And your intrepid curiosity, and you continue to be curious,
which keeps us going and gives us purpose.
So thank you so much.
So please, without further ado,
we have 70 minutes, 75 minutes with a talk back afterwards.
So please enjoy tonight's reading
of Nat Turner in Jerusalem by Nathan Davis.
[humming]
- NAT: Do you see, my friend,
thy Lord hath not forgotten thee.
[chuckles]
Let no one ever say you are a chain.
No, you are chosen.
Men will mock you, saying you're old and rusty,
saying you are weathered. [chuckles]
But what do they know about the weather?
To them, it is either hot or it is cold.
And they think the rain is only for the crops.
Can you imagine?
All that rain just for crops,
just to make plants grow and nothing else?
It is sunset.
Have you ever seen a sunset just like this?
Is this one more beautiful than all the others?
Or do I see it better because I know it is my last?
Oh, my friend, [chuckles]
what a wonderful thing to see,
and what a awful thing to know.
The sun will set over the hill,
and then it will be the moon's turn
to keep watch over Jerusalem.
And tomorrow, all of Virginia
will come to the gallows to watch me die.
My friend, were you listening
when the judge pronounced his sentence?
You will hang by the neck until you are dead, dead, dead.
Why did he sentence me to death three times?
Does he think I am great enough
to live three lives and die three deaths?
Then he is mistaken.
When I am preaching, friend, I must appear great.
When I testify to others of the miracles of God
and the signs the Lord has shown me,
I forget my wretched self.
And so I appear great.
But friend, who can I speak of God to now?
What do you call a preacher
whose congregation is his chains and shackles?
What do you call a general
who was the last survivor of his army?
The mighty commander of absolutely no one.
Is this the same loneliness that Noah felt?
If it is, where is my ship?
Where are the sails that I can hoist?
Where, oh Lord, are your rains, your storms,
your floods, and your meteors?
Have I misread the hour?
You've placed a window within these prison walls.
And even here you've shown me Heaven,
but how can I go there with peace tomorrow
if my work on Earth has come to nothing?
[door slams]
- THOMAS: Hi there, Nat.
I've said hello.
I have greeted you.
I brought a lantern.
It's dark in here.
It's only going to get darker.
I blame the sun.
It's always going somewhere,
always on its way to some other place it has to be.
The lanterns, however, they wait for you.
You have to keep them lit, but they are happy to stay.
- NAT: Doubting Thomas.
- THOMAS: What's that now?
- NAT: Are you not Doubting Thomas?
- THOMAS: Don't you remember me?
I'm Mr. Gray.
We spent three days together just last week.
- NAT: You're standing in my sunset.
If you don't mind, sir.
- THOMAS: You do remember me, Mr. Gray.
I'm the one who put down your confession
and I need to hear more from you before you hang.
- NAT: Before I hang, hang, hang, you mean.
- THOMAS: Sure, whatever you like.
- NAT: You know your Bible, don't you, Thomas?
- THOMAS: My given name does not concern you.
- NAT: But you know, from your Bible, whose namesake you are.
- THOMAS: Can't say I remember.
- NAT: Why have you returned, Thomas Gray?
- THOMAS: I have heard it said
that when a man approaches the door of death,
his thoughts change.
He may even experience a new attitude of heart,
and faced with his imminent departure,
a matter that was sealed shut in his mind may open again.
- NAT: My fate is sealed,
but I assure you, my mind has never been.
- THOMAS: Yes, well, it is my country's fate
that yet hangs in the balance.
And I fear I almost spilled the dish, as it were.
That's what happens when one tries
to be in so many different places at once.
I've been up and down the parish, gathering information.
Even now I'm expected in Baltimore.
- NAT: Who was expecting you in Baltimore?
- THOMAS: A publishing house.
Once I get my copyright secured, I'll take this.
- NAT: What do you mean by your copyright?
The right to copy?
- THOMAS: Yes.
Well, the right to publish and distribute,
which involves copying necessarily.
- NAT: And who can grant such a right?
- THOMAS: The copyright office, naturally.
It protects the rights of the man who has done the work.
- NAT: And is God not a sufficient witness of our works?
- THOMAS: Uh, no.
- NAT: Why?
- THOMAS: Because, God doesn't...
God doesn't intervene, typically,
if someone else tries to profit from your labors.
So as I was saying, [clears throat]
I've been on the road so much, it must be weary of me.
I have no coin to spare, if you can keep a secret,
but still, I'd wager that the hours I've spent on horseback
this past week surpassed those I've spent on my own two feet.
You know, it's one thing to hear about your butcheries, Nat,
but I have witnessed firsthand
just how long is the shadow of terror
you and your band of monsters have laid.
Every city and town I pass through
has the look and demeanor of war.
More than once, I've had rifles aimed at me as I rode
and been made to dismount
and show all the possessions in my satchels
and explain where I was going and why.
Yesterday, I was shot at and given no apologies.
"You know, you're riding alone," they said to me,
"And we don't know you from a nigger.
"We're not taking chances."
Now, I have tried to be sensible and sober amidst this chaos.
And I must admit that I have a certain disposition.
When everyone seems to say one thing is true,
I assume the other must be correct.
So I've said to my countrymen again and again
that none of the evidence I have gathered
points to a wider insurrection,
and all of this destruction was born with you.
And so it shall die.
But Nat, all these hours on horseback have cleared my mind.
What you have told me here,
which I am about to send to the public far and wide,
begs much, much further scrutiny.
Have I failed to uncover something in what you've said?
You know, it harrows me to the hollows of my bones
to think what I may have overlooked
and that I am leading my people like lambs
to yet another slaughter.
- NAT: When you say you will send that far and wide,
how far is far, and how wide is wide?
- THOMAS: To the ends of the earth, if I'm lucky.
- NAT: And there will be copies made, many copies?
- THOMAS: Thousands.
- NAT: And you own the copyright?
It belongs to you?
- THOMAS: Well, of course, who else?
I'm the one who put your confession together.
- NAT: But the insurrection, as you call it,
it was not your work.
It was God's work.
- THOMAS: The copyright is not for your dreadful acts.
It is for their official record,
and your voluntary confession of them.
Now, I asked you if you had any knowledge
of other revolts in the making, and you stated that--
[clears throat] What are you doing?
What has happened?
- NAT: I have stood up.
- THOMAS: I thought you were fastened?
- NAT: I am.
- THOMAS: No, to the wall, to the floor, to something solid.
- NAT: I promise not to kill you.
You have my word.
Now, why do you doubt my word?
You turned your back just now to light the lamp
and what did I do?
Haven't I proven my restraint?
Why are you frightened?
- THOMAS: I have not said that I am frightened.
I have remarked that when we had our meetings,
you were secured.
If I were your jailer, I would not be so loose.
- NAT: Few men aspire to be the guards of prisoners.
It is little better than being a prisoner oneself.
I said to the guards the other day,
one of the guards the other day,
"Which one of us is on the wrong side of the bars,
"which one of us is the real captive?"
He laughed.
And then we laughed together.
Next day, he brought me a half a loaf of bread
his wife had baked.
It was still warm.
Now the jailers have come to know me,
and some of them are kind.
They have been made to believe I was a murderer.
- THOMAS: And now they think you are not?
I hope you'll understand if I keep my distance.
- NAT: There's not much distance to be had in here,
but sure, take all you want.
- THOMAS: Well, surely you don't deny that you're a murderer?
That you didn't unmurder anybody since last we met, did you?
You didn't bring any of your victims back to life?
If you did bring some of them back to life,
I hope you started with the children,
that infant that we found headless in the fireplace
at the Travis' house.
Undo that deed and I will call you murderer no longer.
And just...kindly keep your distance.
- NAT: If you truly fear for your safety, Thomas Gray,
go fetch the guard,
insist that I be fastened, as you say.
Is that not within your power?
[Thomas clears throat]
- THOMAS: Now I asked last week
if you had any knowledge of other revolts in the making,
and you stated that-- - NAT: I have no such knowledge.
And I told you as much.
- THOMAS: Well, you admit here
that the groundwork of your rebellions was laid gradually
and with quite a measure of patience over years and years.
- NAT: The signs came when they came,
and I followed them, one after the other.
- THOMAS: Oh, so the signs were your co-conspirators
and no one else?
That is your claim?
Hmph.
And what am I to make of this episode
some six years ago you say it was,
wherein you claim to have escaped
and to have spent 30 days alone in the wilderness?
- NAT: I have claimed nothing.
I have spoken.
I have answered your questions,
and I have not lied, Thomas Gray.
[Thomas chuckles]
- THOMAS: An old judge once warned me
never to mistake not lying for the truth.
They're neighbors,
but they are not at all on good terms.
Now, a slave runs away, and for 30 days he is free.
No one catches him.
No one finds him.
And then on a whim, without provocation,
he returns, having spoken to no one,
having planned nothing, having heard nothing.
- NAT: I did not say without provocation.
I said that God instructed me
to return to the service of my earthly master.
- THOMAS: But years later,
you were told to kill your earthly master.
- NAT: All of them, everyone who owned me,
who was given me as a gift, who traded me or lent me out,
all of them and all their children and relations
I have sent to God for final judgment.
- THOMAS: And do you not wish for more vengeance
for the masters of all your own kin and kind?
Do you not withhold the truth from me now
because you believe or want to believe
that a future rebellion might succeed
where yours has failed?
- NAT: My purpose is accomplished.
- THOMAS: And what am I to gather from that statement?
I dare say it smells not a little like a threat.
- NAT: Are you a friend of the two men named James?
They also liked to ask fruitless questions.
- THOMAS: James, did...?
Oh, Mr. Trezvant and Mr. Parker? - NAT: Yes.
You all ask the same questions.
It's as if you think maybe if I ask him like this,
his answer will change.
Maybe if I ask him in a loud voice,
his answer will change.
Maybe if I ask him while brandishing my gun,
his answer will change.
Maybe if I ask him after sundown,
his answer will change.
The sun is down, Mr. Gray.
- THOMAS: Indeed, it is.
- NAT: That was my last sunset.
I was planning to look out the window there
and see it off over the hill.
I won't be able to watch it rise.
There's no eastern window.
That was my sunrise as well.
But why should I complain?
Where I'm going, the sunrises are infinite.
- THOMAS: It must be a great comfort to think so.
- NAT: Now, you said you were not an angel,
and you do not act like one,
but nonetheless God has sent you to me this night.
I'm sure of it. - THOMAS: Is that so?
You're sure? - NAT: Mm-hmm.
My grandmother used to say that if you cross a river
and then you come to that river again,
you have not crossed it right the first time.
- THOMAS: A wise woman, I am sure.
- NAT: Thomas Gray and James Trezvant
and James Parker and Thomas Gray again.
Thomas and James, and James and Thomas.
These are the rivers of my Providential twilight.
- THOMAS: If you say so, I shall not argue
so long as you answer the river's questions.
Now there was the slave named Gabriel, some 30 years ago.
- NAT: The year I was born.
- THOMAS: 1800? - NAT: Yes, that very year.
- THOMAS: As was I. - NAT: Is that so?
- THOMAS: It is.
- NAT: Gabriel blew his trumpet and out we came.
[Thomas chuckles] - THOMAS: Yes.
Well, no, no, not really, but that's very funny.
- NAT: And here we are.
- THOMAS: Inarguably, we are indeed here.
- NAT: So there you have it.
- THOMAS: Did word of Gabriel's conspiracy inspire your own?
- NAT: I do not know.
The knowledge of it was in the air and still is.
Once something is in the air,
you can't help but breathe it in.
It becomes a part of you.
Then you breathe it out,
and your own substance is mingled with it.
- THOMAS: Now, there there were whites in league with Gabriel,
as you must have known.
Were there any that aided you?
Perhaps helping to coordinate your attacks
with those elsewhere?
- NAT: No, sir, there were not.
- THOMAS: And as to these other smaller uprisings,
these recent instances in North Carolina.
- NAT: I know nothing of them, sir.
- THOMAS: Be patient, now.
Be polite.
Well, they happened more or less at the same time as your--
- NAT: Unbeknownst to me.
- THOMAS: So you have said.
- NAT: The wind blows and the leaves are stirred.
What good does it do to ask one leaf
what the others are up to?
- THOMAS: Well, they are all leaves, so maybe they--
- NAT: No.
- THOMAS: Then we are at an impasse, Nat, wouldn't you say?
Do you truly feel no remorse?
At least for the women you killed?
For the children?
The little infants?
- NAT: None whatsoever.
- THOMAS: And what of those of your own color
who followed your treacherous steps
only to be cut down?
And those who were innocent, but mistaken to be conspirators?
Many of their heads are now adorning sign posts.
Do you truly not believe you are to blame for all of this?
For any of this?
[Thomas chuckles wryly]
Nat, you have been tragically, gravely misguided,
betrayed by strange imaginations,
but you have not been completely without reason.
And I ask you to use some measure of that now.
Was it not sound logic and good sense
that bade you to give up your sword
when you saw it pitted against Mr. Phipps and his gun?
- NAT: I suppose it was. - THOMAS: Oh, certainly, it was.
- NAT: It took more than that to preserve me.
- THOMAS: Well, granted, but still, you--
- NAT: When he spotted me,
protruding from my hole, he did not shoot me.
And I gave him my sword,
and a crowd gathered around once I was captured.
I feared they would tear me limb from limb.
They did not.
And before that day,
I had lost almost all hope of making it here to Jerusalem,
yet God, who is able, made my way.
It is not unlike the story of the big wooden horse.
- THOMAS: You talking about the Trojan horse?
- NAT: God is most ingenious in his methods.
- THOMAS: There was a whole army in that horse,
not a solitary prisoner.
Nat, with all due reverence to the Lord,
are you sure that divine guidance has been your friend?
It seems to have been a poor help to your cause.
It didn't help you rally your men,
once they were face to face with a real fight.
It brought no honor, no deeds of valor.
Did you manage to defeat anyone who was not a child,
a woman, or otherwise wearing his pajamas?
- NAT: Yes, we did. - THOMAS: Not many.
- NAT: As many as we could.
We did the work of death upon as many of your kind
as we could.
Victory was never promised.
This was not war, Mr. Gray.
This was a warning.
Had things broken our way,
we might've survived a few days longer,
might've brought more of you to the grave,
but we did what we could.
And that must suffice.
[Thomas huffs]
- Thomas: Sometimes, I feel melancholy for the whales.
Honestly, I do.
We just go and we take them, take them from the ocean,
and put them in our lamps and burn them.
Sometimes I worry that there's a limit,
that one day there won't be any whales left.
And I suppose that's a silly thought.
The ocean is large and probably deeper than we know.
I shouldn't worry.
Hold this for me.
I think you need a few more chains.
I'm going out for a smoke.
[door slams]
- NAT: What was your name?
If whales have 'em? [laughing]
Oh, you must, mustn't you?
Of one sort or another.
What part of the sea was your home?
Water is the very opposite of fire,
and yet here you are.
What of the goodness of your life now?
What of the wickedness?
It's all fallen away, and what remains
is a light for men to see by.
[door slams]
- GUARD: Let me see your hands.
Your hands where I can see them.
Put out that lamp.
Put it out.
[soft music]
- GUARD: You need water?
- NAT: My friend, you have not been so harsh with me
since I first met you.
- GUARD: I've known you but 10 days and a pinch of tobacco.
- NAT: That's more than enough.
The world was made in only seven days.
And there wasn't any tobacco to start with.
- GUARD: Yeah, but those days were...
- NAT: Go on.
- GUARD: Those days were not like other days.
- NAT: Nor are these.
[Guard hawks and spits]
I like you, friend.
You are simple,
but yet you think deeply, very deeply.
You remind me of Hark,
my most faithful soldier and the smartest.
His name was Hark, and he hearkened, indeed,
to the Sound of the Trumpet. [chuckles]
Won't you loosen these chains a bit?
- GUARD: I'm here to follow orders.
That was my order.
Now do you need water or don't you?
- NAT: I need the lawyer to return.
My words will be like fire and my faith like oil.
And he is the one God has chosen to spread 'em.
- GUARD: If God's hand is half as clumsy as that lawyer's,
we're all in trouble.
- NAT: When will he return?
- GUARD: God or the lawyer?
- NAT: Ha, [chuckles] either one.
- GUARD: How the hell should I know?
- NAT: Will you kindly bring the lawyer
his lamp and ask when he's returning?
- GUARD: I'm not your messenger.
- NAT: So be it.
- GUARD: Did you like the bread?
I gave you half my bread the other day.
- NAT: I remember.
- GUARD: My wife made it.
She bakes excellent bread.
- NAT: Yes, she does.
- GUARD: Aren't you thankful?
- NAT: Did I not say as much?
I thank you.
And please, pass my thanks to your dear wife.
- GUARD: I do not think I will.
- NAT: Well, it seems we're at an impasse.
You won't deliver the lamp.
You won't ask for Mr. Gray.
You don't seem interested in offering me water anymore.
And you will not leave.
- GUARD: Must you say everything I'm doing and not doing?
Must you speak it out loud?
- NAT: My apologies, friend.
- GUARD: Must you call me friend?
- NAT: No, not at all.
It is a habit I have,
when speaking to someone who feels like one of my kindred.
It is not expected, I realize,
that I should feel any kinship with you or you with me.
But sometimes our words jump straight out from our hearts
before we know any better.
And then we have to sort them out or disavow them.
- GUARD: Or pull them back in.
- NAT: Yes, if we can.
- GUARD: Pull them back. - NAT: Yes.
- GUARD: Pull them back once they started down the road.
- NAT: Yes, exactly.
- GUARD: Like the wife of Mr. Williams.
I heard about that, you know.
I heard the details this morning.
I heard the details.
- NAT: You should not always trust what you hear.
- GUARD: They say you killed Mr. Williams and his two boys.
- NAT: We did indeed.
- GUARD: And they say that Mrs. Williams almost got away
and you caught her about half a mile down the road.
And you dragged her back by her hair,
and you laid her down next to her dead husband,
and you shot her like a sick dog.
- NAT: I do not think she got a half mile down the road.
And I know she was not dragged by the hair.
That would have taken the far too long.
We flung her over a horse, as I remember.
- GUARD: I want my bread back.
- NAT: I've eaten it.
It's long gone.
- GUARD: Quiet out there tonight.
- NAT: Yes.
- GUARD: The mob finally gone home.
Reckon they're all resting up to watch you die?
- NAT: I'm sure of it.
- GUARD: You know how much money they offered me
last weekend for the keys?
$100.
They pooled their money.
They said, "We'll give you $100 for the keys
"and one honest hour with Nat Turner is all we need."
And tomorrow, they'll skin you after they kill you.
But these boys was going to skin you alive.
[Guard sighs]
$100.
And I turned my back and I said, "Go on, wait till Friday."
Of course, if I would have took the money,
the militia would have been after me.
Your skin and bones is worth more than $100.
You might not be no one's slave anymore,
but don't think they still won't sell you.
They'll kill you,
and then they'll make a killing off of you.
You know what I mean?
You know, you might not be no slave.
You might've killed your master
so you're not his nigger anymore.
But so what?
All that means is now you're everyone's nigger.
You're Virginia's nigger now.
And that's just the facts.
Ain't my fault you lost your war.
Ain't my fault they caught you.
I just follow orders.
Can't afford not to.
- NAT: Then it's you who are Virginia's nigger.
- GUARD: Mm-hmm.
Right.
And what does that make you?
- NAT: Nothing but what I always have been,
a servant of my Heavenly Master.
- GUARD: What Heavenly Master
would want the death of Mrs. Williams and her children?
What is heavenly about that?
It was a good family.
- NAT: How do you know?
- GUARD: Mrs. Williams was a most polite woman
and her boys had good manners.
That's what I heard.
- NAT: Manners are virtuous ornaments.
Politeness is honorable clothing,
but justice is the body itself.
My sword was made for bodies.
- GUARD: You deserve all you're gonna get tomorrow.
- NAT: Are you the one who will escort me to the execution?
- GUARD: No, You're off my hands at dawn.
- NAT: Will you be there?
- GUARD: Trust me, everybody will be there, with lunch.
- NAT: I'm not asking about everybody.
I'm asking about you.
By tomorrow,
we'll have known each other 11 days
and a pinch of tobacco,
and I'll be surrounded by enemies and strangers.
If you were there,
I will look for your face in the crowd.
I have been praying for a friendly face
to remind me of the gentleness of God.
The works He has made me do have been harsh and bloody.
And I long for that feeling of my younger days,
standing in a soft rain,
knowing yet little of the world,
and thinking it was tears of mercy pouring down.
A kind face in my final hour might take me there again.
- GUARD: You asked me a question.
Do you remember?
About the prison bars and who's on the wrong side.
Do you remember?
You made me laugh. - NAT: Yes.
- GUARD: Well, now I have an answer.
It doesn't matter who's on the right side
and who's on the wrong side,
because I would never choose your place
and I would never choose your complexion.
And I would never give away my freedom.
God would have to do it for me.
[clears throat]
[door slams]
[humming]
[door slams]
[Thomas sighs]
- NAT: You brought a table.
- THOMAS: I like tables.
I find them pleasing.
Give me a nice table and a reason to use it
and count me a happy man.
Now, shall we-- - NAT: Is your table informed
of the weight it must carry tonight?
- THOMAS: It is accustomed to the lean
of my dead father's lazy elbows.
This is nothing.
- NAT: It is far from nothing, sir.
Those pages you will copy,
beware if you say they are nothing again.
I have an Almighty Protector.
- THOMAS: And I have paper
and quite a bit of ink, and a table.
So between the two of us,
we have everything we need, don't we?
By all means, speak.
- NAT: What did you pray for when last you prayed?
- THOMAS: Relief.
- NAT: Relief from what, Thomas Gray?
- THOMAS: You're not my preacher.
Your poor dead masters took you to be good
because you truly seem so, but I'm not they.
Now, it's time to hand over your sword again, Nat Turner.
Whatever other uprisings or revolutions or revelations
or whatever it is you want to call them,
whatever plans you are aware of here
or in North Carolina or in another state or anywhere,
whatever it is you know, just tell me, hmm?
It won't end well for your people.
You know that.
You've seen the proof of what happens.
If this is the fruit of years of calculation
and providential signs led by someone
as educated and knowledgeable
and as trusted and as charismatic
and as resourceful as yourself,
operating under the not so watchful eye of,
as you must admit, a kind and liberal master,
if all of that has come to ruin so quickly,
what can be the hope for any other such attempts?
You do yourself and your race a grave disservice
if you do not intervene and make known what you know,
and stop the next doomed conspiracy before it starts.
- NAT: I consent, Thomas Gray.
I will make known to you what I know.
- THOMAS: You will? - NAT: I will.
- THOMAS: Well, excellent.
- NAT: But before I do so, you must make an oath.
- THOMAS: An oath?
To whom? - NAT: Myself.
[Thomas scoffs]
- THOMAS: I am to swear an oath to you?
Even if you were a white man and my word to you were bonded,
I would never swear an oath to a lunatic.
- NAT: Then you will never pry a word
of what is to come from my lunatic tongue.
[Thomas sighs]
- THOMAS: What is the oath?
- NAT: You must swear that you believe me
with all your heart and soul.
- THOMAS: Everything you've said to me is honest,
as far as I can tell.
And this reflects that.
My notes are copious.
The characterization of yourself is fair and accurate.
And I have added little in the way of commentary.
- NAT: Commentary?
- THOMAS: Very little of it.
- NAT: Words of comment, words in addition to my own?
- THOMAS: Only what is standard and required.
- NAT: Show me what you have written.
[Thomas scoffs]
- THOMAS: What?
You want to write your own confession?
You want to write it or dictate to me
how to tell it word by word?
And you think that I will put my name on it?
My career would be over.
Maybe even my life.
That's just not how things work, Nat.
Now, like it or not, I am your mouthpiece.
Like it or not,
there are certain requirements and expectations
and functions that I have to fulfill.
What do you think that you will get
by staring at me like that?
- NAT: I accept that it is God's will.
- THOMAS: That what is God's will?
I don't understand.
- NAT: I accept that it is the will of God
that the pen and the page
are entrusted to you in these times.
- THOMAS: Oh.
Well, good, then.
- NAT: And thus, your duty to that document
is the same as your duty to the Lord.
I pray that you are up to the task.
- THOMAS: No need to pray.
I've taken your statements, had them corroborated by others,
as well as by hard evidence, in some cases.
The court documents are secured.
All that remains is up to you.
Now, if you expose other villains lying in wait,
I do not doubt that you will preserve
as many of your people's lives
as you have needlessly squandered, perhaps more.
God's designs are not always what we expect,
as preachers always say.
There's a great chance before you now.
- NAT: Before us, you mean.
- THOMAS: Well, yes, but it depends on you.
- NAT: It depends on us.
- THOMAS: I have been ready since I arrived
to take down what information you are willing to give.
I'm still doubtful that you intend to live up
to your part of the bargain.
- NAT: You have not sworn that you believe me.
- THOMAS: Now, as I told you, insofar as I can tell,
everything you've said to me is honest.
- NAT: I don't care if you think I'm honest.
Swear that you believe me.
- THOMAS: I swear I believe you.
- NAT: God, not myself, was the author
of all the deeds you've cataloged.
Swear that you believe it.
- THOMAS: What would such an oath accomplish?
- NAT: Everything.
You cannot chronicle an act of God
if you are not yourself, a believer.
You will miss the mark.
You will badly miss the mark.
- THOMAS: I believe you believe it.
- NAT: That is not sufficient.
- THOMAS: The killing of innocent people
is an act of God?
One minute God is a loving protector,
and the next he's smashing in your face with a fence rail?
- NAT: The Judgment Day is at hand, Thomas Gray.
Have you not read your Bible?
- THOMAS: Infants sleeping in their cradles.
- NAT: Have you not read your Bible?
- THOMAS: The infant at the Travis' house,
the infant that you left headless in the fireplace?
- NAT: Do you believe in the Holy Spirit?
- THOMAS: I believe that you are a fanatic.
- NAT: Do you believe in the voice that spoke to Moses
within the Burning Bush?
- THOMAS: 10 children at the Waller house,
children gathered there for school.
- NAT: The Lord Christ has laid down the yoke
He has borne for the sins of man.
Do you hear me, Thomas Gray? - THOMAS: Stop this.
- NAT: The blood of the lamb was on the corn.
Words in the tongue of Heaven were written on the leaves.
The voice that spoke to Moses spoke to me.
- THOMAS: Stop speaking in this manner, Nat.
You must stop now.
- NAT: What questions do you have about this matter?
I have just unfolded the very truth.
The blood was on the corn.
That means that Christ is casting off his yoke.
Virginia is awash in her own sin.
[Thomas sighs]
- THOMAS: The children, Nat, the little infants.
- NAT: Yes, what about them?
- THOMAS: What?
Even if you believe that God is angry at the white man,
and there are some white men too
who believe this, against their own sense and interests,
but even if they were right,
and you were right, and I'm not conceding that point,
Nat Turner, even if God was angry at the white man,
if somehow we were blinded and misguided, even so,
I can never believe that God
would ever desire a slaughter of innocent children.
It is unconscionable in every sense.
It is more than misguided.
It is a gratuitous idea.
It is a thought that blacks the mind,
it should never be spoken aloud.
It should never penetrate the air.
Why would any holy being want that?
- NAT: What do you think holy vengeance
is supposed to look like?
Or do you not believe in such a thing as holy vengeance?
Is it merely an idea in your mind,
or is it only holy when it is far removed
from your times and your lambs?
Why do you think it can never happen to you?
Do you not know how many children
are being crushed beneath the foot of this nation?
Stolen from their mothers,
driven from their homes, hunted as for sport.
What of the children of the Cheroenhaka,
whom you pushed away from the river?
Do not an Indian child's scalp still fetch a price in Richmond?
You will say that what is done, what is being done must be done.
That they are savages.
You are savages.
Your deeds are the deeds of savages.
You yourself are the master of how many Negro children?
- THOMAS: None.
I sold my slaves when I moved to Jerusalem.
- NAT: Yes, but you were not blind to what happens.
Do you know the fate of all the Negro children
that God placed in your care?
- THOMAS: No, I do not.
- NAT: You will be too fearful to write this in your report.
And men only listen to the voice of God
when it tells them what they already want to hear,
but let this be known between me and you.
I am the return of all the plagues of Egypt
come in this day to this nation.
The Earth's most prideful and most prosperous.
Do not grieve for your slain children.
They are in Heaven with their innocence.
What greater danger could there be for the souls
of those infants than to come of age here in Virginia?
If you loved your own daughter, Thomas Gray,
you'd smother her in her cradle this very night.
- THOMAS: What do you know of my child?
I have never spoken a word about my child in your presence.
Who has spoken to you of my daughter?
I demand to know!
[chains clanking]
- NAT: No one has spoken to me.
[Thomas gasping and exclaiming]
[door slams]
[humming]
[vocalizing]
- GUARD: Lawyer'll be back soon.
Says he needs some air.
Why'd the light go out?
There's oil for days.
I said, why'd the light go out?
Bad lamp, I reckon.
[Nat chuckles]
Have I made a joke?
- NAT: My mother had the whitest, whitest teeth.
The moon was just reminding me.
[Guard clearing throat]
Has Mr. Gray asked for a stool?
- GUARD: Well, he said to bring a chair for you.
That's all I got.
- NAT: He said the place a chair for me there at the table?
- GUARD: But I don't got no chair.
- NAT: And what else did he say?
- GUARD: He wants your chains removed.
- NAT: And what was his reason?
[Guard scoffs]
- GUARD: His reason ain't working right, if you ask me.
He asked me if it was midnight.
I said, "It's well past midnight."
And he said it must be
'cause his eyes was playing tricks on him.
He says you ain't told him what he needs to hear.
He says he'll trust you if you trust him.
And he says if you wring his neck, then so be it.
[chains clanking]
- NAT: Thank you, friend.
- GUARDS: I have two daughters, twins.
Suppose you think I should kill them in their sleep?
I heard what you said.
I was listening.
I heard all that mess you said.
- NAT: Your wife, the baker of the bread,
is she your children's mother?
- GUARD: She is now.
My first wife, she gave birth to the twins and it killed her.
So I married my new wife.
I like her better, to be honest.
She's prettier.
She bakes all the time and she never complains.
My first wife, she complained about everything
and she even complained about me, and I beat her for it,
and then she complained about that.
And then she up and died.
And now I got this new, pretty wife.
And now I feel guiltier than sin.
- NAT: There is no salvation to be found for you here.
Take your little girls
and take your pretty wife and fly from Jerusalem.
Get clear from Southampton County,
leave Virginia behind.
- GUARD: Where would I go?
- NAT: Due east.
- GUARD: Due east?
[chuckles] No, that don't make any sense.
- NAT: Go east until you touch the ocean
and then keep going.
Either God will teach you to walk upon the water
or he will not.
But walk, you must.
- GUARD: You're telling me to take my family into the ocean
and just walk into it and never come back?
- NAT: Unless you want to be here for the Judgment Day.
- GUARD: What do you reckon is gonna happen
on the Judgment Day?
My preacher says Jesus is coming back.
And that He's going to be riding on a cloud.
And that every eye on Earth will see Him.
But where's a place in the sky that every eye on Earth can see?
Must be real high up, do you reckon?
- NAT: You are wiser than you pretend to be, friend.
Tell me what you think will happen.
- GUARD: Don't know.
Reckon Judgment Day will be a long day though.
Reckon it'll be long,
like the beginning of the world was long.
- NAT: Yes.
And this country will either cease its injustice
or it will slowly fall to ruin.
Leave it while you can.
- GUARD: We'll see, I guess.
- NAT: Have you ever popped a mosquito?
- GUARD: Popped a mosquito?
- NAT: A mosquito lands on your arm, and you squeeze--
- GUARD: Oh yeah, and you squeeze your arm
and the mosquito bites and fills up with blood and then--
- NAT: Yes, and then it pops.
- GUARD: That actually works? - NAT: Yes.
- GUARD: Huh, who knew?
- NAT: If your preacher knew his Bible, he would've said,
he would've told you how God punished the Romans,
how He turned their once mighty empire to dust.
It was not unlike the popping of a mosquito.
- GUARD: That's not in any Bible story I ever heard.
- NAT: It's a hidden message in a hidden story.
- GUARD: Where's it hiding?
- NAT: The blinding brightness of the sun.
Jesus said, "Render unto Caesar that which be Caesar's."
Is that not the worst of punishments?
- GUARD: What's that got to do with mosquitoes?
- NAT: Well, the mosquito can hardly believe her fortune
when the skin bulges, offering itself to her freely.
When the blood rushes into her hungry mouth, it is too late.
She can't free herself.
And likewise, the Romans, children of Caesar,
saw the Earth swell with the blood of their enemies.
God nourished them with victory upon victory
until finally, they choked on the excess of it.
And try as they might to reverse their fate,
they fell by weapons of their own making.
So shall it be here.
Leave while you can.
- GUARD: Well, I'm not walking into the ocean.
I'm not drowning my family.
- NAT: Take them to the beach, at least.
Let them hear the rushing waters.
They'll never want to come back inland.
- GUARD: You talk about my family again
and I'll cut your tongue out.
- NAT: If your first wife is in Heaven,
I'll send her your regards tomorrow.
My father ran away.
He escaped and he ran away and he never returned.
I almost followed in his footsteps.
I had an overseer for awhile who really did not like me.
He was a little like yourself, except that he was cruel.
Very cruel.
He probably killed cats and dogs as a child.
So I ran from him,
and I could see my father's footprints
like traces of faded light.
I could have followed them, but I hesitated,
against my better sense.
I did not follow.
I lived in the wilderness for a month,
eating and drinking little, praying much.
And finally, God spoke to me.
He told me not to escape, but to return.
And I returned.
I gave my will and myself to God that day.
And tomorrow, finally, He takes my spirit home,
and I will leave my body on the gallows.
That's where you'll find my tongue, if you must have it.
- GUARD: Lawyer must've had enough air by now.
You won't wring his neck, will you?
- NAT: I will not.
You have my word.
[door slams]
Armies tread the Earth up and down,
lighting fire upon fire of destruction,
such a dreadful battalion I might've led,
and conquered every heedless nation on the Earth,
burning them down to their soil and to their roots.
But our Lord did not grant me that victory, Mrs. Whale.
[chuckles]
It's flames like thee that last and endure,
lighted with care and purpose.
After the Judgment Day,
it is wisdom that will judge the work of generals,
even myself, though my tenure was short.
Wisdom will say,
"Who did the work of God, and who of Satan?"
There shall be an eternal light and there shall be a mighty pen,
and leagues and leagues of pens shall wait behind it.
After Judgment Day, the world will be rewritten
by the light of a million lamps.
What can Doubting Thomas and I bequeath them?
[chanting]
- THOMAS: What if I confess something to you?
I don't believe in God.
Or in Heaven.
I don't believe in Hell either.
What do you think about that?
- NAT: I think a fish is never thirsty
until you take him from the sea.
I think not believing in God is for rich men.
- THOMAS: Well, I'm poorer than I've ever been.
My father was a planter, and I'm just a lawyer.
That is not the right direction to be moving in society.
And my grandchildren
may end up like your friend, the jailer.
What do you think about that?
- NAT: I think that you are a rich man
who thinks he is a poor man.
I wish for the good of your soul,
you were truly a poor man.
- THOMAS: Let me be as plain as I can be, Nat.
Do you want freedom for your people or do you not?
Because if you do, you're not helping.
[Thomas scoffs]
I'm not proud to admit that I'm not a believer.
There's really no place for me in polite company.
That is distressing.
But the truth is, people will attribute
whatever they decide is virtuous to God.
And they are actually just worshipping themselves
and their own thoughts.
Maybe they are fooling themselves.
Maybe they are hypocrites.
What does it matter?
The abolitionists think God hates slavery.
The powers that reign in Virginia think God loves it.
Who's right?
I can tell you without a doubt who is right:
whomever wins the argument.
God is not going to free the Negroes,
and your insurrection will only serve as proof
for the argument that your people
need to be more severely controlled.
Now there is, as I'm sure you hoped,
much consternation among the whites,
not only here but across the country.
They fear it is only the tip of the arrow.
That this must be evidence of a much larger conspiracy.
And fears, Nat, are more insistent forces
than logic and reason.
Perhaps that is why God wants us to fear him.
Don't you think?
And the other part of my confession
is that I could care less either way
for slavery as an institution.
I do not care if it survives.
As I told you, I've sold all my slaves
and I still have debts that need to be paid,
and a tiny mouth to feed.
That is my concern.
Now, you said you would tell me what you knew,
but first you wanted to make me swear an oath.
And I agreed.
And it turned out,
you wanted to make me a believer.
Now that is admirable, I suppose,
but still impossible.
So let me then provide an alternative.
The information I'm asking of you
is as of much practical help to your cause
as it is to my advantage.
Lay out for me the full conspiracy.
Tell me what plans are lying in wait,
where, when, how, and who.
If this alone will quell the national fears
that you have engendered,
when whites are afraid, you see what happens.
They panic, they tighten their grip.
They increase your people's misery.
Just help me to help you.
That's what I'm saying.
And once everything is fully brought to light,
the fear subsides and the work of the abolitionists,
which you have tragically interrupted, can continue.
As for me, honestly, the benefits are straightforward.
If I expose the great conspiracy,
my standing and this confession increase 10 times in value.
I pay off my debts,
which are both considerable and embarrassing.
And as a gesture of good faith,
the only faith I'm ever like to manifest,
perhaps I can afford to buy the freedom of a slave or two.
You cannot have my soul,
but you can have my work.
And if you want,
you can call it all the plan of God.
I care not.
[Nat chuckles]
- NAT: Thomas Gray,
you put the doubt of Doubting Thomas to shame.
Doubting Thomas would not believe what he could not see,
but you, why did you have my chains removed?
Haven't your eyes seen a miracle tonight?
- THOMAS: I've learned not to trust my eyes.
I have not slept an honest night in more than a year.
My time of troubles began long before your rebellion.
- NAT: And do you not see a sign from Heaven in that?
- THOMAS: No, I do not!
- NAT: Then what is it you see?
- THOMAS: I see every last angel in Heaven
standing idly by while my wife dies of fever,
refusing to hold our daughter in her arms,
for fear that she too will catch it.
I see my own father,
so consumed with hatred for me and for my non-belief
that he'd bequeaths nothing to his son,
except the desk to do the work of executing the will
he's left me out of.
And I see my innocent little child
who has her mother's lips
and eyes like my father's but that they smile at me,
and I have not the means to keep her warm.
So she is passed between my sisters and my brothers.
And they do not know the beauty of her face.
They look at her and they do not see her.
[heavy breathing]
I've said far too much.
- NAT: I have a son.
I have a wife.
Their protection and safety
I have never been able to ensure,
nor am I permitted the right to.
And it is Negro women, servants in wealthy houses
who feed and nurture children like your daughter,
women whose own children may be snatched from them
at any time and sent God knows where.
Speak not of grief if you do not know those women.
The dew on the grass each morning
is their unanswered prayers returning
only to be offered up again.
You, Thomas Gray, have been given
a small portion of the sorrows of slaves
so that your pen might not falter
when you write about these times.
- THOMAS: If that is what you think,
then give my pen some words it can use, Nat Turner.
- NAT: I shall.
I shall tell you all I know of the great conspiracy,
as you call it.
But first, you must pray with me.
- THOMAS: No, absolutely not.
- NAT: I understand that you cannot believe, Thomas Gray,
but still, you must pray.
The form of faith at times can call the Spirit.
And if, as you are sure of, there is no Spirit,
what harm can the words do?
Face east, say the prayer as I reveal it.
- THOMAS: We will get this finished then.
And you will talk.
- NAT: East is that way.
Repeat after me, sir.
I see no Lord in Heaven.
- THOMAS: I see no Lord in Heaven.
I like this prayer so far.
- NAT: On your knees, like so.
[Thomas sighs]
Hands outstretched, palms upward.
Eyes closed.
I see no Lord in Heaven.
- THOMAS: I see no Lord in Heaven.
- NAT: And how could I? - THOMAS: And how could I?
- NAT: His light is another light.
- THOMAS: His light is another light.
- NAT: I hear no voice of God, and how could I?
- THOMAS: I hear no voice of God, and how could I?
- NAT: His song is another song.
- THOMAS: His song is another song.
- NAT: I shall not assign the law of man to God.
- THOMAS: I shall not assign the law of man to God.
- NAT: I shall serve the truth and the truth alone.
- THOMAS: I shall serve the truth and the truth alone.
- NAT: I shall open my eyes to the light of truth.
- THOMAS: I shall open my eyes to the light of truth.
- NAT: From whatever horizon I see it dawning.
- THOMAS: From whatever horizon I see it dawning.
- NAT: I shall attune my ears to the voice of truth.
- THOMAS: I shall attune my ears to the voice of truth.
- NAT: No matter the tongue that speaks it.
- THOMAS: No matter the tongue that speaks it.
- NAT: For my Lord is-- - THOMAS: I have prayed.
I have prayed.
Now, what have you to say?
Nat, it is time.
It is long past time.
I have prayed as you asked me to.
- NAT: Have I crossed your river, Thomas Gray?
Or have I not? - THOMAS: What?
Oh.
Yes, the...sure.
Yes, yes, you have.
- NAT: Is that the truth?
- THOMAS: The truth is that I tire of metaphors.
I'm weary of talking in circles.
It is time for facts now.
It is time for names.
It is time for location.
It is time for information I can use.
Tell me all you know, and tell me now.
- NAT: I shall. - THOMAS: Thank you.
- NAT: I know nothing,
other than the signs the Lord has shown me.
That is the whole truth.
- THOMAS: This cannot be.
- NAT: It is so.
But I will teach you how to read the signs yourself.
- THOMAS: This cannot be.
- NAT: As I said, the winds are blowing.
The leaves--
- THOMAS: No, I will have no more metaphors!
I will have facts.
- NAT: The fact is that there was an eclipse of the sun
and people everywhere saw the black overcome the white.
- THOMAS: I've already written about these delusions, Nat.
Your confession is filled with them.
- NAT: And why do you think that is?
- THOMAS: Speak of North Carolina.
These little uprisings,
these little skirmishes in North Carolina.
- NAT: It's exactly as I've said,
I know nothing about them.
Go there and interview them.
- THOMAS: They're dead, justice was swift!
They are dead as are any suspected of aiding them.
- NAT: Then learn to talk to ghosts.
The signs, Thomas Gray, are everywhere.
The uprisings will never cease until injustice ceases.
Your children will never be safe until injustice ceases.
The low, no matter how low you make 'em,
will see the signs in the sky that they should rise.
And if you blind their eyes, they will hear it
in the call of birds, in the barking of dogs,
the howling of wolves, in their own howling,
in their own songs of grief, they'll hear the signs.
And if you stop their ears, they will feel the signs
in the vibrations of the Earth itself.
To cease injustice is your only recourse!
Already, the sands are shifting beneath your feet.
- THOMAS: I cannot write that.
Nobody will print it.
Nobody will buy it.
And my head will end up on a spike, just like yours will.
- NAT: That is my confession.
Is it not my confession, Thomas Gray?
- THOMAS: I will not write your gospel.
I will not immortalize your insanity.
If I was a river that you sought to cross,
then now I am a great ravine.
I will pass on nothing of your visions.
I will say nothing of the Day of Judgment,
or the blood on the corn,
or the hieroglyphs on the leaves.
It will all die with you!
Unless you give me something I can use.
- NAT: I have nothing more to give you.
- THOMAS: Lie to me, if you have to.
- NAT: This will not be decided here, sir.
I have spent many silent hours,
days and nights alone in the wilderness.
I fasted, I prayed, and at times,
I had but a glimmer of light to walk by,
and on certain overcast and moonless nights,
no light at all.
This is now a matter for your silent hours, not mine.
[door slams]
* And the people said
* Oh Lord
* Ah oh, my God
* Oh Lord
* Ah oh
- GUARD: Dawn almost, I think.
I have to put your shackles back on
before the next man comes in to replace me.
- NAT: The next man will escort me to the execution.
You will not? - GUARD: That's right.
- NAT: But will you be there? - GUARD: I don't know.
My wife don't much like hangings.
- NAT: I was hoping you would tell me with your eyes
in my final moments.
But if that is not to be, then tell me now.
Tell me that I crossed the river.
You heard me, did you not?
You heard me wade in.
You heard me fight the current.
I was not unfaithful.
I went into the water and I fought the current.
Did I not?
I put my feet in one by one.
And I went in to my knees and to my neck,
and submerged myself completely.
I did not walk upon the water.
I sunk.
But I kept walking until I reached the river's bank.
Say that I am standing on the other side of the river.
Not the first side.
- GUARD: It's always hard to say, ain't it?
The first shall be last,
and the last shall be first, and all that.
- NAT: Yes, friend, preach to me.
- GUARD: No, no, I don't know how to do none of that.
- NAT: You don't need to know how.
It's probably best you don't.
Preach to me how you preach.
- GUARD: Crossing the river,
that ain't the all in all.
It's the going in, right?
That's the baptism.
The baptism is you go in the water.
- NAT: Yes, that's the baptism.
Preach to me, friend, preach.
- GUARD: You can go in any side.
- NAT: Yes!
- GUARD: You can come out any side.
- NAT: Yes, Lord!
- GUARD: The Lord is on every side.
- NAT: Yes, every side.
- GUARD: Every side. - NAT: Yes!
- The Lord is the forgiver.
- NAT: Yes, the Lord is the forgiver.
- GUARD: The redeemer. - NAT: Yes!
- GUARD: The Lord is, oh, the Lord is...
- NAT: The Lord is victorious. - GUARD: Yes!
- NAT: The enricher of the poor!
- GUARD: The enricher of the poor, yes Lord!
- NAT: The healer of the sick!
- GUARD: Healer of the sick, the reviver of the dead!
- NAT: Yes, vanquisher of the mighty!
- GUARD: Protector of the weak! - NAT: Yes!
Knower of things unseen.
- GUARD: Yes!
[heavy breathing]
I don't know what to say next. - NAT: That's all right, friend.
That's all right.
- GUARD: Amen.
- NAT: Amen.
Amen, amen.
[breathes deeply] - GUARD: Amen.
- NAT: Amen.
- GUARD: Whew.
When I was little, my mama said I'd be a preacher,
but I don't like church or preaching.
- NAT: Well, that's just as well.
When the long Day of Judgment begins,
words and sermons will be everywhere,
but the faithful must preach with deeds.
- GUARD: Well, that's harder.
Come on now.
[chains clanking]
I've said before, I'd never choose your place,
but if it's true that the first shall be last
and the last shall be first.
If that's true...
- NAT: You sounded sure it was true a minute ago.
- GUARD: But if the first shall be last,
and the last shall be first,
that means I shouldn't be here shackling you
if the first shall be last and the last shall be first.
- NAT: Come to my execution.
That's all I ask.
- GUARD: Everybody dies alone, you know?
No matter who's there and who's not there.
- NAT: That isn't true.
- GUARD: What difference does it make where I go
or where I don't?
The world is gonna forget me just like it'll forget you.
- NAT: Don't betray your faith now, friend.
- GUARD: I need my stool.
- NAT: Go home, but do not go to sleep,
at least until afternoon.
I will look for your face in the crowd.
[door slams]
[exhales deeply]
The sun rises in the east,
and the window is in the west.
[humming]
- Brenda: Well done. [crying]
There's Nat Turner.
[applauding]
So, so beautiful, you guys.
- Nate: Thanks. - La Shawn: Thanks.
[all laughing]
- I'll see if Nathan will join us, Nathan Davis.
Congratulations.
Hi, Nathan.
- Nate: Hey.
- Nathan: Great job, guys.
- Brenda: To introduce you, Nathan,
this is Gavin Lawrence, our director.
- Nathan: How you doing?
- Brenda: And Michael Morgan, our voice and text coach
who worked on the piece with everyone.
- Nathan: Beautiful job.
- Nate: Thank you, man.
- Nathan: Thanks.
- Brenda: Sorry about that.
And this is La Shawn Banks who played Nat Turner,
and Nate, Nate Burger.
- Nathan: Nice to meet you.
- Brenda: Thanks for coming on with us, Nathan.
- Nathan: Yeah.
- Brenda: It's such a, such an honor to do your piece.
It was really gorgeous.
I was gonna ask you before we started,
I just know that,
please, everyone that's watching the talk back,
if you would just put your questions in the Q&A chat,
we'd appreciate that.
And then we'll answer them as we go.
Thanks so much.
And for those watching on PBS Wisconsin,
we wanted to let you know that this is prerecorded.
So you can't ask any questions,
but we're gonna ask all the good questions
while we're doing this.
So you don't have to worry.
Nathan, I just wanted to ask you, how did you start this?
Or what, why did you start this?
What was it your inspiration for writing this piece?
- Nathan: Well, I read the documents,
The Confessions of Nat Turner by Thomas R. Gray.
And I think when I read it,
I was somewhat surprised by what I read.
I mean, I don't know what I expected to read,
but what I got out of that document was a lot more,
and a lot-- the implications I felt were a lot,
a lot more powerful than I maybe had expected.
You know, I think I was expecting
something to the effect of,
"I didn't want to be a slave, so I rebelled," you know.
- Brenda: Mm-hmm.
- Nathan: But in fact, what's contained in that document
is really more of a mystical approach.
And it really is
dealing not simply with the idea of slavery,
but with the idea of destiny, with the idea of faith.
And I thought it was extremely inspiring
and kind of challenging.
And I think knowing all the history, I mean,
not knowing, I'm not a historian,
but thinking about all the history around that
and how it came to be,
and what exchange may have happened between these two men,
I think was really interesting to me.
And so I decided to write a play, which is, you know,
not an easy thing to do,
but over time, it eventually came out.
- Brenda: I mean, the language in that, I read that too.
And after I read your play, I went to the document,
and I encourage everyone to read that.
The language in that piece was so profound
and unexpected, like you said, unexpected.
I just, it itself was a piece of art almost
just to listen to that language.
I wondered if, how much that infected the,
how much of the actual document infected
the actual script that you wrote?
- Nathan: Yeah, definitely, the language is very heightened.
It's probably somewhat typical of, you know,
formal documents of that time period,
but it also certainly had a religious bent to it.
I'm a member of the Baha'i faith.
That's my religion,
and the sacred writings of that faith
also have a similar heightened style
when they're translated to English.
So I definitely, you know,
felt like that was important to maintain
in order to explore the story
from a kind of a spiritual perspective
in a way that I thought needed to be explored.
- Brenda: Did you see, did you, I don't know,
this might be a crazy question, Nathan,
but I just want to ask,
did you feel he was providential?
Did you, did you ever think, I mean,
looking at the history of his life
and the things that he was known as a child, you know, his--
and the kind of prophetic nature of his life
and how people viewed him,
did it ever feel to you as if he was providential,
that he was from God in that way, prophet-like?
- Nathan: That's a good question.
I guess basically I took him at his word,
what he said in the document.
I mean, it's complicated because,
of course, the document itself wasn't written by him.
It was written by Thomas Gray, right.
But without going into all the ins and outs of it,
I felt like, okay,
there was clearly something exchanged here
and Thomas Gray would have had the power
to really write whatever he wanted.
So why write something so strange
and so mystical and so enchanting and so powerful?
And he seemed like he wanted
to attempt to set the record straight
about Nat Turner in certain ways.
And it wasn't simply a damning account of his character
by any means, even considering, you know,
the time in which it was written and the context.
But yeah, and essentially just took Nat Turner
at his word when he said that he saw signs in the heavens,
I assume that he did see signs in the heavens.
You know, the mid 1830s was it was a time
of a messianic expectation all around the world.
There were a lot of religions and offshoots of religions
that were founded in that time.
There was definitely something going on.
- Brenda: Mm-hmm. - Nathan: So, you know,
without pretending to be like an acolyte per se,
[Brenda laughs] to say that, you know,
I took Nat Turner at his word about what he saw
and what he said he saw.
- Brenda: Yeah, I have to say,
I was moved to like, what is, yeah, who's to say?
Who's to say, right?
Gavin, I just want to ask you,
I know you read that document as well.
And when you approached the piece,
how did that influence, like, your thinking about the piece
when you read the actual confession?
- Gavin: Well, for me, it helped
just to understand the conflict in the play.
It helped me to be able to kind of illustrate
and map out with the actors what each person wanted.
And the whole, in my opinion,
the metaphor of what was taking place in 18,
in the 1830s or in the Antebellum South,
in terms of how Blacks were treated,
how enslaved people were treated by white Americans,
I felt it allowed me the language and the ability to,
to pit that contradiction against what the, you know,
the lawyers telling Nat that
"How could you do these horrible and dreadful things?"
And, you know, his confession basically gives us the answer,
gives us the reason, gives us the response.
So it allows, I think the actor the understanding,
the inspiration, the motivation
to sink into the skin and bones of that character.
- Brenda: Yeah, La Shawn, how was this,
how was this to play someone, to play,
did you read the confession or did you know about him,
or what did you know of Nat Turner
before you started this process?
- La Shawn: I knew the story of, the story of the uprising.
You know, it's interesting, you know,
Nat Turner devoured Scripture, like he devoured Scripture.
So I think it's like anything that you get,
you know, it's like, you, you only,
if you never touched a Bible,
you're not gonna see signs, you know.
- Brenda: Yeah. - La Shawn: So it's like y'know,
that's not gonna jump out at you if you're not looking for them.
Nat Turner devoured Scripture.
So it makes sense, you know, to me that,
you know, I'll take him at his word as well, you know,
and you have to, in my mind, you have to remember
that this is, you know, if you think about what happens now,
and like, when, you know, when there are,
you know, serial rapists and murderers,
and bad people, you know,
there's a system that says, you know,
"Those people cannot live among society anymore."
You know, that something happens to those people, you know,
whether it's they go to jail,
they go to prison for a long, long time or forever,
or they're executed, right.
It's like there was no system for that, for this here.
You know, so it was gonna be the other thing, you know,
and in my estimation, and I don't know,
nothing prepares you to play...
some, you know, to play that.
But what's beautiful about this, Nathan,
is that God is in the play.
So I get, so that's just so relaxing.
[La Shawn laughing] - Brenda: Mm-hmm.
- La Shawn: It's actually really, it makes it fun.
It makes it, not fun to, it's not fun material,
but it makes it as a place to rest.
And it's all taken care of, you know.
So that's what's really, what's beautiful about,
I think about how the piece is woven together.
And because that is obviously so important for,
it's such a, for Nat that's, that's everything,
like he says, it's everything.
"It's important that you believe
"that God authored this, that I did not.
"Why you here trying to blame me for that?
"I'm not the author of this," you know, so yeah.
That's very beautiful.
- Brenda: To speak to Nathan,
what you said about the document itself
and the confession that Thomas Gray wrote.
I was just gonna ask Nate Burger, like,
what was it like to approach these two men,
these two men who had this encounter with this Nat Turner
and they both had some kind of infection of sorts?
I mean, it infected that document
and Thomas Gray's writing.
It wasn't intentional, he didn't come in there
to write that document, obviously,
and the guard didn't come in there to be,
to be infected or affected by this person.
What was that like?
What did you see the difference
between that kind of encounter with Nat?
- Nate: Well, I mean, he did come in there
to write that document,
you know, and I think why did he come back?
Because he's already got the document.
At the top of this play,
he's already gotten a confession.
What does he need for himself
and for like, his perceived tribe?
That was an interesting starting place
that Gav really helped me get to.
And I think the thing about the guard
that I really love is that they have,
I don't know, it's that thing of, like,
I love that line in the play where he's talking about,
you're a, you're a poor man.
You're a rich man who thinks he's poor,
when he's talking, when Nat's talking to Thomas Gray.
"I wish for your sake that you had been poor."
And I think that that's the little bit of overlap
that the guard has.
He has faith and he has a kind of poverty.
I mean, he's not a slave, but he can see a little bit
of a mirror in that guy.
And I think he can see with empathetic eyes.
And I think he can see with a little bit
of generous religiosity and faith.
And I don't know, it was interesting, you know.
I love playing multiple characters.
It's my favorite thing.
And I love kind of picking apart small things
for each of them.
I don't know.
I'm not answering this question well.
[all laughing]
- Brenda: I don't know if it was a good question or not, but.
- Nate: Yeah, I just kind of wandered around some.
Sorry. - Brenda: It's all good.
Thank you.
I wanted to go to Carey Cannon.
You're out there and there's so many people
who have so many questions and so many comments.
- Carey: I'm just gonna tag onto that.
Hi, thank you all so much for a beautiful reading,
and Nathan for your beautiful play.
I'm Carey Cannon.
Hi, I'm an associate here at APT.
And on that note about your decision to,
and in previous performances,
the guard and Gray had been played by the same actor.
Can I ask you what your thoughts were
about making that choice about having that,
that role double cast?
I know, and then I'd love to ask Gavin's thoughts on it
'cause we talked a bit about the possibility
of using two actors for those roles.
And Gavin's decision to go with what you had chosen,
and how it had been produced previously.
So I'd love to chat about that.
- Nathan: Yeah, I mean, so the way that that evolved
was that originally,
I hadn't planned on having the guard in the play.
I had planned on writing a two-hander
with Nat Turner and Thomas Gray as the two characters.
And then in the middle of the first workshop
I was doing of the play,
we had two actors and as I was writing,
I was like, "Oh, there's a guard."
And then-- [Brenda laughs]
- Brenda: There's a guard. - Nathan: Right.
I mean, we certainly could have like tried to scramble
and find another actor to bring in.
But I think because I had already envisioned it
as a two-hander, I just, you know, it naturally...
I was using in my mind the constraints that
I have one actor to play these roles already.
And then I think, you know, I did consider the question of,
should I potentially not double cast the role
and just, you know, let it be,
you know, a separate actor who's a different character,
which would also work.
I think fundamentally I felt as if it's just different,
if there's a conversation between two people
versus one person.
And like, yes, the guard's a different character
than Thomas Gray, but you have two actors
having a conversation on stage as opposed to three.
And I felt like there was something
about a conversation between two people
that I wanted to preserve.
- Brenda: Mm-hmm.
It's so amazing as you start making up all kinds of things
about that one, the two sides of that,
of the white people out there, you know.
It's amazing what we start to make up about that.
Gavin, you want to speak to that a little bit?
- Gavin: Well, that completely contradicts
the reason I thought he did it.
No, I'm kidding. [all laughing]
- Brenda: Make it up, make it up.
- Gavin: No, no, no.
This is what this, what it was for me.
I was, I found it very interesting
to be able to explore two sides of white malehood,
like manhood, white manhood, at that time.
So I wanted Nate to lean into not just that,
not just the kinship that Nat seems to have with the guard,
as opposed to Thomas Gray,
but where is there an overlap, right?
What do both of those characters need
that somehow come out
no matter which one we're looking at?
So I thought that was really interesting.
And as an actor, also,
the places where there is that overlap,
I find it to be very...
it's just a magnificent thing to kind of witness
the similarities, but the differences,
and well, now that I've heard Nathan say that,
that makes a lot of sense.
Is you're hearing two voices come from one person,
but you're seeing the same person,
even though it's a different character.
I think there's something powerful in that.
And then for me, I just tried to just speak to
how that represents white America, then and now,
and the ridiculous irony that that was then,
but it feels so present.
It feels so relevant and relative
to what we're experiencing as a country,
that that white male privilege is still
kind of at the undercurrent of all,
in my opinion, our problems.
And it was really beautiful to see one actor explore that
with a different voice.
I don't know if I answered that question either.
I'm hanging-- - Brenda: Yeah, no, I think--
- Nate: You did better than me, man.
That's all right. [all laughing]
- Brenda: I think that it's an interesting thing too,
as a white person watching it, that you start to say,
like the privilege on one end of that white character,
and then the guy who's closer, like you were saying Nate,
about it being able to see into a world that wasn't you,
but to find some common ground and such.
And I just find Nat to be so compelling
because he pulls both of those guys to him
to find some common, some commonness,
something that is missing and lacking in everyone.
And I just, I, I love this play, Nathan.
[laughing] I love it.
And tonight's reading just completely convinced me.
It's, I wanted to ask Michael, what do you,
the poetry of this piece? - Carey: I did wanna say,
tagging onto that, Brenda,
and just saying that there were a bunch of questions
about voice, about sound. - Brenda: Voice and text, yeah.
- Carey: Michael Morgan and his ability
to be with this team for the week
and about the sound of imagining the sound of that time,
imagining the sound,
helping Nate with these two different characters
and finding Nat Turner's voice that was so resonant,
and La Shawn's great gift, of course, his gorgeous voice,
but how, how that sound has grown
and how you all found that together.
Sorry to interrupt Brenda, but it was exactly the same
that two other audience members wanted to talk about.
- Brenda: No, no, I just want to,
I appreciate that, that it was so apparent
that the poetry of the piece needed.
I mean, I got a text from Gavin halfway through the process
saying "Michael Morgan is a genius."
So he can do magic, magic, magic.
So I wanted to just have you, Michael.
[applauding]
- Michael: Thank you, thank you so much.
It was a real privilege and honor to work on this play.
I mean, I agree that there's so much relevancy.
It's both a sort of historic treatise,
but it's also, it resonates,
really in terms of the issues and that are still current.
And I think the approach through the text,
I mean the text is always the key,
and breathing through that text
was really about finding the centers of both,
all three, really, there were three characters here,
and looking at the details of course
of speech patterns in the old South and Southampton County,
which is a very specific place in 1831.
And then looking at the blends of characterizations,
the different kinds of influences that come into that,
the fact that Nat Turner was highly educated.
- Brenda: Yeah.
- Michael: And what does that do to his sound?
You know, how does he express himself?
What is his degree of articulateness?
And how can he shift gears?
How can he code switch from one speech to another speech?
Because he's also a laborer with a really cruel overseer,
but he's also a scholar and he's also, you know,
this very spiritual being.
And then looking for those layers too,
in both of the characters that Nate played.
I mean, it was, it's always sort of intricate,
but exquisite when you start to tap into text and language
and the words that people say,
and how those come out of their meaning,
who they mean as people,
and the arguments I thought was so beautifully drawn,
Nathan, in this, in this play.
So that gave us little, like things to hang on to
in terms of making points
and clarifying what the sort of like,
not the warfare is, but what the debate was.
That is again so fundamental and so deeply woven into,
I believe, the fabric of this country.
So it's, you know, you can only do that
with really good materials, all I can say.
- Brenda: I have to say the ideas.
I mean, I know that I love a good play
that just makes me think the whole time,
just makes me compelled to keep thinking
and thinking and thinking,
and the poetry just lifts you out of yourself at times.
It's exquisite.
What else you got over there, Carey?
- Carey: I do, I have a couple, like two different areas.
One is about the production of this Zoom,
as we've been exploring poetry and plays in this medium.
So some of the questions
were about the choices of the illustrations,
how Gavin chose to work with Casey,
how that came about, the recording of the music,
the music itself,
and then what Nathan's perspective,
whether or not he'd seen this play
in a production that wasn't on stage
and what his perspective is in terms of storytelling
in this medium.
So one of them's medium, and then we'd love to talk,
there's another playwriting question I'd love to ask,
but I'd love to start with this production.
Gavin, if you would speak to choosing illustrations,
what the, how the music came about.
- Gavin: In reading it,
I was looking for a way to stitch this play together,
the scenes together on a Zoom platform, right?
Because we're so limited in certain ways.
And so initially I heard music,
and then just in my head as I was reading it,
and then I thought it might be boring
to just hear music between one scene to the next.
So can we find a way to visually,
without like flipping genres too much,
can we find a way to visually enhance
getting from one scene to the next?
And so Casey is an amazing artist,
and I thought, "Wow, Casey does these sketches
"and they're really beautiful."
And you know, those cartoons that were done back in the day,
you know, we'd still see them in the newspapers today.
I just thought that that would be an interesting way.
I didn't know if it would work,
and I'm still not sure that it does,
but that was the thinking that went into it,
was just how can we stitch this together
and keep an audience visually connected
from one scene to the next?
- Brenda: I think it worked beautifully.
And I think that the thing that it really did at the top
was place us, because the thing in Zoom
that is so hard to do is not be an actor in a room
with a blank wall behind you.
And it just immediately,
those images and that style of illustration
immediately placed us where we needed to be.
I thought it was wonderful, I thought it was--
- Carey: And Gavin, I think you ended up recording
much of that music in between the scenes yourself.
I heard your voice. - Gavin: Yeah.
- Carey: Talk about making it work.
- Brenda: Talk about your vision.
- Gavin: Well, the initial plan was to have real singers
sing those transitions, but because of scheduling--
the amazing Jamal James and Elise Dickerson
were supposed to do it.
And we tried, but since we're not in the same place,
I would send them files
and somehow a key would get changed
and it just became too much.
And so I had already just as a backup [laughs]
done just versions of it with myself on Garage Band,
which I'm not proud of, but it was what we had.
- Carey: I thought it worked great.
- Gavin: It is what it is.
- Carey: I wanted to reach to Nathan.
There's a question about,
and I'll read the question and then let you extrapolate,
but Nathan, can you talk about your sense
of the inevitability of things building to a crisis
that seems to be in the play?
The whales, climate change, the struggles of black people
that Nate Turner predicts will go on and on,
the moments in this play where there are rocks that ripple,
as we as a contemporary audience see the ripples now,
and how intentional those moments were
and where you are with the storytelling at this point?
- Nathan: I'm not sure I fully understand the question.
- Carey: [laughs] Let me read it.
So in the sense of inevitability of things
building to a crisis.
So there are moments in the play when we,
we as a contemporary audience anyway,
hear him talk about, sure, there'll be whales forever.
And when we talk about, or when Nat says,
this is not gonna be finished now,
that these moments that you drop into a play
that works as itself as a narrative that happened in 1830,
and yet you are allowing us as a contemporary audience
to hear the echo of what we can't help but hear now.
That, I mean, I've had the opportunity,
this is just me now, Carey,
of reading three of your plays in three days.
And it seems that there are, in The Wind and the Breeze ,
Dontrell, Who Kissed the Sea ,
there are ways that you're able to ground these plays
in the now and in the now of the narrative of the play,
and yet allow us to, as contemporary audiences, connect.
And in this play in particular,
because it's so specific to its historical period,
there are a lot of us who,
when we read it for the first time,
and as Gavin said, speaks to white America now,
and even as you discussed the sort of code switching
that each of these characters do,
I'm just interested, as was this Adrianne Moore,
who's a colleague of ours, who's voice and text,
about the text, about dropping those moments in.
- Nathan: Okay, gotcha.
Yeah, I mean, I guess thank you for noticing.
[all chuckling]
Yeah, you know, Thornton Wilder talked to about it a lot,
you know, and on the stage,
in theater on the stage is always now, right?
No matter what time you're writing,
it's always now.
So really, I think it's a matter of the existential crises
that we are facing now,
that we've always been facing to a certain extent.
But you know, I'm living now.
And so certainly much of what's said
is filtered through my own experience
and the things I think about.
But I think a lot of those things,
you know, some of them come naturally.
Some of them come out of nowhere.
Some of them are, you know,
put in and taken out and put back again.
But in essence, I think it's just trying to write the play
and trying to make it work, you know,
and recognizing that.
I think a lot of times a play,
I think if a play is successful, not always,
but I think there's a certain kind of play
where if it's successful,
you feel like it's kind of about everything.
You know what I mean?
Like, how do you, how do you say
oh, it's only about this one subject or this one theme.
And I do think I aspire to try to write things that,
you know, have a broad, not appeal, but you know,
that deal with life like, writ large, you know?
That's definitely a goal of mine.
So I'm glad that some of that is translating.
- Carey: Thank you.
Brenda, you're muted.
- Brenda: I'm sorry.
Yeah, I started to say, Nathan, the attraction--
I'm sorry, the attraction to the piece from the beginning,
the first time I laid eyes on it was...
What we're always searching for at APT specifically
is something that would be speaking to the larger continuum
of ancient versus now versus future.
And that's why this play was so impactful to me
and perfect for us because I kept hearing things
I didn't understand about the past
in conjunction directly with things I understood
to be true about now,
and things I hoped would not be a mystery in the future.
And so many speeches in this and so many lines in it
just like injected into like, this is happening right now.
And you wrote this in 2016.
Is that when it was published or when was it written?
- Nathan: Yeah, 2016 was the first production.
So it must have been like spring of 2015
through the fall of 2016.
- Brenda: Do you think it would be different
if you wrote it today?
How would it be different in your mind?
- Nathan: That's a very hard question to answer.
I don't know. - Brenda: I know, right on.
- Nathan: I mean, I'm sure it would be different.
- Brenda: Yeah.
- Nathan: But, you know, I think also
what this kind of reminds me of is that
there are certain things that...
you know, it's said that truth is stranger than fiction,
you know, a lot and that type of thing that comes up a lot.
And there were certain things that I thought I was making
almost like too contemporary of a leap.
For example, I was at first not sure
about the idea of making Thomas Gray,
like an atheist-ish, you know, talking about that.
And I remember I had the instinct to do it,
and it seemed like it made sense, like for the play,
but then I was like, I don't know how realistic that is.
Maybe they won't bring it up.
And then of course at the theater
that I was working with was like,
"This atheism thing for someone 1830s in Virginia,
"is that really plausible?"
And I was like, "That's a good question.
"I don't know."
But then as we did our research,
we actually found actual like factual evidence of this
for Thomas Gray the actual person.
In a way, that was shocking.
It was like basically, that the one complaint
that his friends had of him is he spoke out against God
and that embarrassed them. - Brenda: Wow.
- Nathan: And then apparently on his death bed, despite that,
he was like quoting Bible verses.
And like, he had some kind of weird,
you know, something happened.
So all of that is again, like, I didn't know that when I,
when I first wrote the, did the first pass,
but it's just one of those things that reminds you
that as you know, our idea of history
is often less strange than the actual history.
- Brenda: [laughs] Yeah. - Nathan: So...
- Brenda: You know, you said something happened to him.
Nat Turner probably happened to him.
- Nathan: Yeah, I mean, that's, that's my theory.
- Brenda: Yeah, I agree with you 100%.
- Nate: Good instinct, man. [all laughing]
- Brenda: Yeah, way to go. - Nathan: Yeah, thanks.
- Carey: We just have time for one more,
and I'd love to just be able to talk or ask La Shawn,
'cause there were a couple of questions about your,
you know, week-long, such a constricted rehearsal period,
journey with this script,
with this character, with Gavin, with this play,
to talk a little bit about your experience
bringing Nat to us tonight.
- La Shawn: Man... [laughs]
Being, no matter how much I try, this is, this is funny.
No matter how much I try to not be an actor,
[chuckles]
'cause sometimes I try to not be an actor.
Stories, you know, you itch for stories like,
stories like this, or to put yourself in something
that is just, that just feels, I, well, I should say I search
when the opportunities arise.
You hope, you hope for, you hope that they're good
and that they're rich and that they are full of opportunities
to just live in truth and not have to, you know,
tear yourself into bits to try to make the thing work.
And this is, and you know, that's why I love Shakespeare
because it's like, well, that's just good.
You know what I mean?
It's just, it was just good plays, you know?
And so it's, so this has been,
this has been quite wonderful, you know,
like I said, it's actually been very enjoyable
because it's, especially now it's a bit of a release,
I think too, you know.
I didn't know that I needed it.
So thank you, APT and everybody,
and certainly Nathan and Gavin and Nate and all of you.
I didn't know that I, in my, you know,
in my four walls here,
and I also like doing plays in my house,
I don't mind it.
[Brenda laughs]
But I didn't know that, right?
I didn't know that I needed, that I needed this right now.
And not in some way, that's like,
it's not in some negative way.
It's just an insight I needed, you know,
there's so much happening and you don't,
and so you feel like, you know,
you feel powerless or you feel like, you know,
there's not much you can really do or that you can,
you can affect change.
And so it's nice when it's so beautiful
and so powerful when art
gets to sort of slam up against that.
And I feel, and I feel, you know, there aren't many,
there are no theaters I'd put on shackles for
but American Players Theater.
- Brenda: Okay, I want to just say that out loud.
Like, I want to just say thank you.
I don't have any idea what that is for you.
- La Shawn: There are no theaters on planet Earth
that I will put on shackles for,
except for American Players Theater.
And so I felt very safe.
I felt very-- 'cause this work is hard.
This work is, it's hard, you know,
it costs, all of it costs, you know,
but it's a beautiful thing.
It's a beautiful pain,
'cause the cost is to be able to pick,
the cost is paying it forward, you know, too.
So I'm elated.
I'm just glad to be in the service.
I'm glad to be of service.
So, you know, to say beautiful words and beautiful,
then beautiful and beautiful well-meant,
and well-intentioned, and I don't know,
just that, just that's everything, so.
I hope that, I don't know if I answered that.
I didn't answer the question very well either.
- Brenda: Oh, you answered it beautifully.
- Carey: Thank you, La Shawn.
I was so grateful to have you all,
and have this story to tell for our audience.
And that's the time we have for questions Brenda,
if you want to...
- Brenda: Yeah, I just want to say thank you
to everyone again, and specifically La Shawn,
thank you for saying that.
And it's really important for our audience to hear that
and understand that we are in a particular situation,
and we rely heavily, too heavily,
and hopefully less in the future,
but on the shoulders of you all,
to try to create some space
where we can see things differently,
and I'm grateful to you.
It's inherently inequitable for you to work with us
and that you do and that you trust us and that we can,
you ask us and we can be what you need us to be.
So you can be the great artists that you are
when you work with us.
Thank you so much.
- La Shawn: Always an honor. - Brenda: Okay.
And so thank you, Nathan Davis for joining us tonight.
It's good to see you.
- Nathan: Thank you. - Brenda: Yeah.
- La Shawn: So great, thank you.
- Brenda: And everyone knows that
this will be on PBS Wisconsin.
We'll get the information out to you.
Thank you, Gavin Lawrence,
for your graceful and wonderful leadership.
And Nate also, thank you.
And thank you, Michael,
and all of you out there tonight.
Thanks so much and God bless,
and everyone take care of yourselves, okay.
And each other, okay.
See you soon.
[classical string music]
- Announcer: Funding for APT's "Out of the Woods"
is provided by
Arcadia Books,
Dane Arts,
Nancy A. McDaniel,
Orange Tree Imports,
Wilson Creek Pottery,
Focus Fund for Wisconsin Programming,
and Friends of PBS Wisconsin.