Trouble in Mind Upstage Guide

Spotlight on Trouble in Mind.

Spotlight on Trouble in Mind Creative Team.

Playwright Alice Childress

Set Design Arnulfo Maldonado

Light Design Kathy A. Perkins

Hair & Wigs Cookie Jordan

Director Charles Randolph-Wright

Costume Design Emilio Sosa

Sound Design Dan Moses Schreier

Original Music Nona Hendryx

What is the show about?

Follow an experienced Black stage actress through rehearsals of a major Broadway production in Alice Childress’s wry and moving look at racism, identity, and ego in the world of New York theatre.  At the forefront of both the civil rights and feminist movements, the prescient Trouble in Mind opened to acclaim off-Broadway in 1955, and was announced to move to Broadway in 1957…in a production that never came to be.

WHERE

A Broadway Theatre, New York City

WHEN

Fall, 1957

Who: Meet the characters.

Wiletta Mayer
A middle-aged Black actress.

Henry
An elderly Irish-American doorman.

John Nevins
A young Black actor who has recently graduated from college.

Millie Davis
About 35 years old. A Black actress with a flair for fashion.

Judy Sears
A young white actress who has recently graduated from Yale Drama School.

Sheldon Forrester
An elderly Black character actor.

Al Manners
In his early 40s. The play’s director. White. Has been working in Hollywood.

Eddie Fenton
The stage manager. White. Eager and quick.

Bill O’Wray
A middle-aged white character actor.

Back to the Trouble in Mind Upstage Guide table of contents

Alice Childress

Playwright

ALICE CHILDRESS (Playwright). Born in 1916 and raised during the Harlem Renaissance under the watchful eye of her beloved maternal grandmother, Alice Childress grew up to become first an actress and then a playwright and novelist. A founding member of the American Negro Theatre, she wrote her first play, Florence, in 1949. The script was written in one night on a dare from close friend and actor Sidney Poitier, who had told Alice that he didn’t think a great play could be written overnight. She proved him wrong, and the play was produced Off-Broadway in 1950. Childress became in 1952 the first African American woman to see her play (Gold Through The Trees) professionally produced in New York. In 1955, Childress’ play Trouble in Mind was a critical and popular success from the beginning of its run Off-Broadway at the Greenwich Mews Theatre, and it immediately drew interest from producers for a Broadway transfer. In an ironic twist echoing the tribulations of the characters in the play itself, the producers wanted changes to the script to make it more palatable to a commercial audience. Childress refused to compromise her artistic vision, and the play never opened on Broadway, ending her chances of being the first African American woman playwright to have a work on Broadway. Trouble in Mind received a well-reviewed Off-Broadway revival in 1998 by the Negro Ensemble Company and has since been produced by Yale Repertory Theatre, Centerstage, Milwaukee Repertory Theatre, and Arena Stage. Childress is perhaps best known today for A Hero Ain’t Nothin’ But A Sandwich, her 1973 novel about a 13-year-old black boy addicted to heroin, which was subsequently made into a movie in 1978. Other plays written by Childress include Just A Little Simple (1950), Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story In Black and White (1966) and Gullah (1984). Alice Childress died in New York in 1994. Throughout her career, she examined the true meaning of being black, and especially of being black and female. As Childress herself once said, “I concentrate on portraying have-nots in a have society.”

Arnulfo Maldonado

Set Design

ARNULFO MALDONADO (Set Design). Broadway: Home, A Strange Loop (Tony nominee), Topdog/Underdog, Trouble in Mind. Off-Broadway: Atlantic, CSC, Lincoln Center, MCC, MTC, New Group, Playwrights Horizons, The Public Theater, Roundabout, Second Stage, Signature, Soho Rep. Regional: Alley Theatre, A.R.T., Berkeley Rep, CTG, Guthrie, Steppenwolf, Woolly Mammoth. Obie Sustained Excellence in Set Design, Princess Grace Faberge Theater Award, Lucille Lortel Award recipient and multiple nominee, Drama Desk nominee, Henry Hewes Design Award nominee. IG: @arnulfo.maldonado.design, arnulfomaldonado.com

Kathy A. Perkins

Light Design

KATHY A. PERKINS (Lighting Design). Broadway debut. Kathy has designed nationally and internationally at such venues as American Conservatory Theatre, Berkeley Repertory, Arena Stage, St. Louis Black Repertory, Goodman, Steppenwolf, New Federal, Alliance, Baltimore Center Stage, Yale Repertory, Mark Taper and Grahamstown Festival in South Africa. She is the editor of seven anthologies, including Alice Childress: Collected Plays. A recipient of numerous research and design awards, she is a graduate of Howard University and the University of Michigan, and Professor Emerita of the University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign).

Cookie Jordan

Hair & Wigs

COOKIE JORDAN (Hair & Wig Design) has designed 15 Broadway shows, including Fela!, Slave Play, Choir Boy, The Cher Show, Once on This Island, Sunday in the Park With George, In Transit, Eclipsed, Side Show, After Midnight, A View From the Bridge and South Pacific. Off-Broadway: All the Natalie Portmans, Girls, Fefu and Her Friends, Aint No Mo, Fairview, Toni Stone, If Pretty Hurts, The Secret Life of Bees, Boseman and Lena, Fabulation, Our Lady of 121st Street, In the Blood, Daddy, Hercules in the Park. Television: makeup for “The Wiz Live.” Cookie has been nominated for three Drama Desk Awards and one Emmy Award, and received two Obie Awards and The Henry Hewes Design Award.

Charles Randolph-Wright

Director

CHARLES RANDOLPH-WRIGHT (Director) has built a dynamic and diversified career in directing, writing, and producing for theatre, television, and film. He directed the smash hit Motown the Musical (Broadway, National Tour, and London) and recently was the Producing Director and Executive Producer with Oprah Winfrey on the new television series “Delilah” on OWN. Theatre credits include the Broadway-bound musical Born For This, which he co-wrote with gospel icon Bebe Winans; the Pulitzer Prize-winning play Ruined and the musical Sophisticated Ladies, starring Maurice Hines, at Arena Stage; the 75th anniversary tour of the opera Porgy and BessLove/Life at Lincoln Center; Guys and Dolls (the 50th anniversary national tour); They’re Playing Our Song (in Portuguese in Brasil); Cabaret Verboten at the Mark Taper Forum with Bebe Neuwirth and Roger Rees; and The Diva Is Dismissed, starring Jenifer Lewis at the Public Theater. Charles wrote the play Blue, which premiered at Arena Stage (where Charles is an inaugural resident playwright). Blue has had productions throughout the U.S., including the Roundabout and Pasadena Playhouse (which starred Ms. Rashad, Diahann Carroll, and Clifton Davis). Charles also wrote Cuttin’ Up (based upon the book by Craig Marberry), The Night is a Child (starring JoBeth Williams), Love in Afghanistan, and co-wrote the Tony nominated Just Between Friends starring Bea Arthur. Television credits include directing the series “Greenleaf,” “Katy Keene,” “Step Up Highwater,” “Lincoln Heights,” “South of Nowhere,” and “Live at Lincoln Center.” He directed the award-winning film Preaching to the Choir and produced and wrote the series “Linc’s”. Charles is an Executive Producer of the film Maurice Hines: Bring Them Back, which recently won the Grand Jury Prize at the NY Doc Film Festival.

Emilio Sosa

Costume Design

EMILIO SOSA (Costume Design). Chair, American Theatre Wing. Broadway credits include Good Night, Oscar (Tony nomination); Sweeney Todd; A Beautiful Noise; 1776; Ain’t No Mo (Tony nomination); Trouble in Mind (Tony nomination); Skeleton Crew; On Your Feet!; Motown the Musical; Lady Day; Porgy and Bess (Tony nomination); and Topdog/Underdog. Recipient of the NAACP, Lucille Lortel and Drama Desk awards. @esosafashion

Dan Moses Schreier

Sound Design

DAN MOSES SCHREIER (Sound Design). Broadway: with Kenny Leon, premieres of August Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean and Radio Golf, among many others. He recently designed James Lapine/Tom Kitt/Michael Korie’s new musical Flying Over Sunset at Lincoln Center. Awards: five Tony Award nominations, five Drama Desk Awards, Obie Award for Sustained Excellence, Lucille Lortel Award, NAACP Theatre Award. Fellow of the MacDowell Colony. Dan composed the music for Coriolanus at the Delacorte Theater. Website: danmosesschreier.com

Nona Hendryx

Original Music

NONA HENDRYX (Original Music) is a songwriter and musician, tackling social issues, love and politics. Fans know her as one of the groundbreaking group Labelle and their No. 1 hit “Lady Marmalade.” Making her Broadway debut with Trouble in Mind she’s reunited with Charles Randolph-Wright. Nona composed music for the original and 2020 revival of the play Blue. Post Labelle, Nona released rock-infused albums. Ambassador for Berklee College of Music, she recently curated and performed in a production she created for The Metropolitan Museum, Sun Ra, in the Temple of Dendur.

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