Where do you see African American Theater in tne next five years?

In this course we read a wide range of plays and ciritcal texts and viewed several film versions of African American plays. Now that you can create a definition of what African American Theater was in the past and is currently, what projections can you make for a future African American Theater audience in the next five years? What do you think that writers and producers can do to cultivate new plays by African Americans and a new audience for African American Theater?

Dael Orlandersmith's Yellowman and Tyler Perry's Diary of a Mad Black Woman

In what way do you see the color politics between light skinned and dark skinned African Americans tie back to early discussions of "plantation mentatlity" in both of these works? Do Orlandersmith and Perry disrupt or complicate any Black stereotypes? How would you situate Orlandersmith's play and Perrys' film (based on his play) within Henry Louis Gates' "legitimate" and "illegitimate" theater binary?