welcome to a taste of theater where everyone is a star today star is shining bright on the one savage of minneapolis minnesota we'll watch a clip of his play why one please introduce realized that that was here for artists and i've just been feeding myself man with with every opportunity i've gotten to be a part of productions are right productions and so here we are all right so tell lady named cherie ella she has a place she did call revelations judgement day and saw filmed a documentary on her and i filmed this during a documentary time i was just watching her put this play together and it was like over that which is film and stage plays and so her and then working with william pierce william pierce i got a chance to film his play but i was behind the scenes a lot just kind of watch and durned rehearsals and stuff like that and so watching william and talking to him just getting some inspiration from those guys they really helped me to push to do my first play which was i'm going to church and i did that play and i learned so much from doing  failures and stuff i had you know i learned so much from that stuff that i used to from my next play so many things have you written well written i have on hand a car probably about seven plays right now wonderful so including the ones that i've done i've done three i didn't want to broken circles broken circle was a free play i did like a community thing to give to a church i just pretty much just gave it away  and then i just the they are just there right so those are my three productions that i've put on but i have have a lease for more plays just sitting while and right is the one that  we're going to feature today right and tell us what is riot all about riot is just a riot the story line is right is about you know a family dealing with their child be a murder and nobody knows what a lot of stuff that's going on today even though i tied it into those those past those past time issues and situations these are things that our community is still dealing with today and so i want to just tell a story about a community that is dealing with the loss of a kid and on top of that the racial tension has boiled over and how we're handling ourselves as a community and why is this story important to tell well it's important today because you know our community african american community is lacking in so many areas as far as people just been able to see the potential in the powers they truly have i think in my opinion you know a lot of people are missing a lot of the the younger generation is miss and they're there opportunities to be you know in their powers to be successful because they're catering to a lot of things that they're that they think that they can't defeat and different things like that so riot to me what i want to roll riot i was just like you know a lot of racial issues that's going on it's a lot of it that's happening because we're led to happen we're let me get to that point you know instead of stop and it went as far as getting there you know weekly after like we control who we want to be alive no matter what no matter what a person says no matter what a power says we can do we want to do but if we give up and you know if there's a potential for you to work at a mcdonald's and work your way up to management to be successful but you give up because it didn't happen fast enough so you want to pick up a crack pack that was going on today you know nobody sees that reality  and what is it that you want people to walk away with after seeing this production it's all about the choices we make everything we do is the choices we make everything you know i'm a i'm a christian i'm definitely a believer and to she finally is just broken you know and i was explaining to the pastor that was talking about how you know we always talk about the miracle but what happens in between a miracle what happens what do we go through what what owner you know just the way that people feel about us people in power to feel about us in this country we still can't get it you know and we are in positions of power and you know so it's like you know i just  talk about you know a lot of people don't want to talk about race when i first cast the photos ready for this play i got an e mail some guy saying there you could hear you people go blaming the man again because of the story line i sent out and so i was like even a person but it's not about race it's not about that it's we have to be we have to be the storytellers to bring people to reality you know and  you were saying that there are we have to be the people who point to light you know point to a situation so so it's so tell me more about some of the characters in this place and  why you chose to tell the story through that character's eye well you have henry henry is the lee is the leader is the father and the father he was a former panther and around this time the panthers are starting to fade out and the crips are starting to start any murders to crips where they came before the blood came so and around this time the panthers there are you know they're doing dope i mean doing heroin bad there and they're not about the movement anymore you know jerry hoover was really you know the cointelpro thing was real was really heavy around this time so within this play you really is is is looking to to bring his brothers back together he's trying but his brothers are responding you got one brother to us that's actually strong out and you got another brother to us telling him a man i got a job i got i got this i'm fine i'm good you know sorry about your son you know so he's done with that and then you know his son james james is dealing with you know being young and he's actually being recruited by the curves to go  police because word around the community is that the police have some to do with it and different stuff like that so while they want to be they want to fire on these police officers and start a riot the mother ruby is this strong black woman she's in the church her faith is broken you know she's she's waiting on god she's waiting on god she don't want to fight she she wants to trust in the lord she's trying to keep everything held together with her spiritual aspect of things and so it's just awesome and it's an awesome story about a black family you know and it could be anybody's family does does that might have been going through that at that time or might be going through  right now interesting so it sounds like which or what your story is is also doing is and lightning what it takes in order to get a community to finally stand up for what's right yeah yeah in a in a way i think we can also we can we can stand up for words right we can do the right thing we definitely can go about it by using our power which is our which is which is our rights in this country but you know they want it in a negative sense going out to kill people going after people who said things on fire in our own communities and diversity of life that don't solve nothing you just burn to distort or to grow shopped you know stuff like that you know i feel like in this day and age we are in a position of power we have the right to be a as we have the right to walk down the street and not be harassed we have the right too we have the right to just you know homeownership and work and succeed in our work grow in our jobs in our companies and different stuff like that so when i when i when we talk about a riot riot is more than just you know police killing a kid and black people going after police this is us waking up and saying hey you know i am i am the power of myself i can do what i what i what i want to do you know so what was the inspiration for riot just wanted i wanted to write something different you know i don't want to i don't  so when i wrote i really want to something i really want to write something about decisions because in life it's all about the decisions we make this is this we have is about the decisions of the past we take you know so i really want to i really wanted to write a story that just dealt with decisions so i did a lot of research on the black panthers i did a lot of research on the crips i watched a lot of different rioting read a lot of writing things about early los angeles i really researched early los angeles because that's the setting of the play so you know and once i did our research i knew i had a story there and then i just began to write and i would walk member came up to and said that they got out of the play that you probably never intended or thought of until they mentioned it which for me off first and foremost is   and that is deep you know i've seen them before i've experienced that you know that part where the part where the cop and i'm not going to give you away but the cop and is dealing with the kid  it happened to his kid but in a different sense the cop was black and he was white so it was like you know it ain't that's what does that's what i wanted people to walk away with it's not just it's a cultural place not just a black on white this is a cultural thing because you know why people going just or only races black people races mexicans races i mean that you have these you have these you have these elements in these races i'm sorry so you're saying there's there's good and bad and everything and everyone and every quarter is yes and also in this particular production riot  was was a good was a was a good start and base for for right and then just dealing with the history of the l a p d ok and then once the gang started actually taking place taking place and how to start it once i did my research i was so i definitely i definitely thought about these other places though because the panthers warning just they were to have more influence or they were all over the country right  so but l a just was like it was like a me and california it was the it was just that place where you really saw the racial tension take place i have two more questions for you the first one is every play right has a ministry what would you say your ministry is in the field a place where i feel like as a christian i want to feed people but i don't want to i don't want to i don't want to i don't to neglect any body so while i can write these stories about the family and the different stuff like that there's a young person out there that want to hear something too and so i definitely want to be able to create stories for everybody you know i feel like my ministry is just talking about our stories of pain and our stories of overcoming these pains but never leaving out the journey you know i'm going to always talk about the journey you know i'm always talk about what god will got us to this place what got us there and what we did to get out of it versus it just happening overnight ok there's going to be someone a playwright up and coming playwright is going to want to sit in that same chair that you're sitting in would advise can you give that up in coming playwright just keep just keep i think number one just just know what you know what you want first life was so it was a purpose you know your purpose and after that just go for because you know continue to separate yourself from others you know continue to continue to create those things that kind of stand out and kind of leave people you know and just be original all right so we're going to watch a clip of riot and we want to say thank you to