Two for the Show

If You Go

I Shall Not Be Moved and Your Negro Tour Guide,

Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati, 1212 Vine St.

Through May 7

Tickets and information at ensemblecincinnati.org.

Please note: These productions are performed back-to-back with one intermission in between. No additional ticket is required.

“I am both personally and professional grateful to have an opportunity at Ensemble to bring these two playwrights together and their vision of what was and what can be for our country and our world,” says D. Lynn Meyers, Producing Artistic Director at Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati.

ETC is currently showing two one-act productions, the newly commissioned world premiere of I Shall Not Be Moved followed by the return of Your Negro Tour Guide, which has been revamped since it last appeared on ETC’s stage in 2010. Rooted in the lived experience of Black women in America, these productions narrate powerful stories of the battle for equity and equality.

The riveting I Shall Not Be Moved is by Cincinnati native and emerging playwright Isaiah Reaves, who drew inspiration from his grandmother’s diaries for this new work. This one-woman show recounts the story of Reaves’s grandmother, nationally recognized Civil Rights pioneer Betty Daniels Rosemond, and her horrifying and trailblazing journey through the American South as one of the first Freedom Riders during the 1960s. Audiences far and wide will experience the internal conflicts and joys of a dark-skinned Black woman’s fearless battle for equity and equality.

“Isaiah Reaves is an inspiration,” says Meyers. “It’s amazing how he wrote his grandmother’s story using her words and his influence as a young Black man in this world. Having these shows to look forward to during the dark days of the pandemic always kept light shining at ETC.”

The updated one-woman stage adaptation of Your Negro Tour Guide draws heavily from columns and National Public Radio commentaries collected in Kathy Y. Wilson’s book, Your Negro Tour Guide: Truths in Black & White, based on her former CityBeat column. Throwing a glaring light on misguided notions of natural Black beauty, Black homophobia, intra-racial bigotry, and other cultural stereotypes, this play allows us, once and for all, to laugh at every secret we’ve held against and sideways glance we’ve cast at “The Other,” whoever they happen to be.

“I have the utmost respect for what Kathy Y. Wilson has done in her career to enhance our vision, to strengthen the connections between people, and to call it the way it is. She’s uncompromising, and that’s what I always want Ensemble to be,” says Meyers.