Overview
THAT SUMMER IN SUMNER is the middle drama in The Till Trilogy, a three-play cycle exploring the epic saga of Emmett Till. While the first play, The Ballad of Emmett Till, is the story of the boy, That Summer in Sumner explores the 1955 trial of his killers. While drawing upon trial transcripts, contemporaneous news accounts, and the abundant photographic and media imaging, the play is not a docudrama, but my imagined interpretation of behind the scenes events from the perspective of three African American journalists covering the trial and from Emmett, himself, his ghost, his cipher, his Kah, coming to grips with what has happened to him.
This is the first play in The Till Trilogy, a three-play cycle which includes BENEVOLENCE and THE BALLAD OF EMMETT TILL, exploring the epic saga of Emmett Till and the birth of the modern Civil Rights Movement.
Casting & Production
Casting
With the actor playing BO as a singular character, an ensemble of nine actors serves as the CHORUS, playing multiple roles as follows:
BO — Emmett Louis Till, a murdered youth, his shapeshifting Kah, its light, and shadow.
JACKSON “JAX” HICKS — 33, JET Magazine reporter and photographer.
MAMIE TILL BRADLEY — 33, Bo’s grieving mother, witness for the prosecution.
ROY BRYANT — 26, defendant, Money Mississippi storekeeper and truck driver.
CAROLINE BRYANT — 22, wife of the accused, Roy Bryant
JW MILAM — 31, defendant, half-brother to Roy and a Glendora Mississippi storeowner.
MOSE WRIGHT — 64, Bobo’s great uncle, tenant farmer and witness for the prosecution.
ALMA “MAMOO” CARTHAM — 53, Bo’s grandmother.
GENE MOBLEY — Mamie’s long-time beau in Chicago.
CLOYTE MURDOCK — 27, Ebony fashion & lifestyle writer, new to the JET reporting team.
SIMEON BOOKER — 37, lead investigative reporter for the JET/Ebony team.
MIKE SHEA — freelance white photographer on the JET/Ebony team.
ROBERT B. SMITH III — Special Prosecutor, a former FBI agent sent in by the governor
SHERIFF STRIDER — 51, oligarchic, rotund cheif lawman of Tallahatchie County.
JJ BREELAND — 67, Sumner attorney and chief architect for the defense.
SIDNEY CARLTON — 40, back-up defense attorney.
DR. TRM HOWARD — 47, Mississippi Civil Rights activist and scion.
RUBY HURLEY — 46, New York-born Mississippi activist and NAACP field secretary.
MONROE ST. JAMES — eccentric New York syndicated columnist, once blacklisted.
ADLINE THOMAS — a barmaid in Glendora Mississippi.
BOBBY HODGES — 18, a witness.
MR. MIMS — a witness.
JW KELLUM — third-chair defense attorney.
DEPUTY SHERIFF COTHAM — newly elected lawman from neighboring LeFlore County.
CONGRESSMAN CHARLES DIGGS — 33, freshman representative from Detroit.
CLARK PORTEOUS — seasoned reporter for the Memphis Press-Scimitar.
AMANDA BENSON — elderly sharecropper and surprise witness for the prosecution.
WILLIE REED — 18, sharecropper and surprise witness for the prosecution.
Setting
Place
Chicago, Illinois and the Mississippi Delta At the crossroads between the sensate world and the other side.
Time
September 1955 to June 2005
with a concentration of days around the week-long trial, “The State of Mississippi vs. Roy Bryant and JW Milam,” September 19-22, 1955.
Reviews
“This play illustrates what laws of equality meant on the ground … Think “The Front Page,” but with more dread … It highlights the machinations of the courtroom, focusing on what Emmett [Till’s] family members and the Black press had to endure in pursuit of the truth and justice in a system that had no intention of delivering either.”
—The Washington Post
“This piece is unlike anything I have ever seen…making the tragedy even more heart wrenching than you initially knew it to be.”
—Broadway World
“Undeniably powerful…an ambitious and panoramic emotional roller coaster…It entertains and stimulates…It grabs us…Startling!”
—DC Theater Arts
“Anything but Ancient History … You can practically feel the entire fear-based ethos of the Jim Crow era … But it would rather converse than preach, rather sing than torture, and rather examine than bludgeon. It plumbs the depths of perhaps the most infamous lynching in American history … Unflinching.”
—District Fray
