On Q Productions Kicks Off New Season with
Cell Phone Blues
On Q Productions, one of Charlotte’s most renowned theater companies, is beginning a new season! The team recently returned from the Fringe Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland where they internationally premiered the already highly praised Miles & Coltrane. On Q Productions new season will kick off by introducing the world premiere of Cell Phone Blues, by Robert Johnson, Jr. Cell Phone Blues is a five-character play set in Charlotte’s black working class neighborhood during the period of community canvassing for Barack Obama’s presidential bid in North Carolina.
A 2009 National Black Theater Festival Reader’s Theater Series pick, Cell Phone Blues is a dramatization of the life of an African-American family that is confronted with unforeseen and debilitating events. Rachel Jackson, a young college student, has been arrested for a drug offense that she knew nothing about. Her father Charles Jackson has uncovered some unexplained cell phone calls on his wife’s cell phone bill, and these two events orchestrate to almost tear this close knit family apart at its roots. This conflict is complicated by David Wallace, a predatory ex-con who seduces young Rachel into a life of confusion that adds fuel to the family’s tragic collapse.
The play tackles the issue of how stable families can be undermined by jealousy and deception, and how the forces of gentrification, drugs and poverty can cause human vulnerability and fragility to escalate out of control. Many people have written about the pursuit of the American Dream. Cell Phone Blues looks at a particular family during a period of political optimism and demonstrates that such optimism seldom catches fire among those on the margins of society and that structural changes of an economic nature must filter down to the poor. Finally, the play explores the tension between dreams of economic success and the ever-present burden and companionship of the blues.
Cell Phone Blues will premiere at Booth Playhouse, Tickets are $18 and may be purchased by calling 704.372.1000 or by visiting www.carolinatix.org. Group rates available at $10 for groups of 10 or more.
Dates:
Wednesday, September 23, 2009 @ 7:30 pm
Thursday, September 24, 2009 @ 7:30 pm
Friday, September 25, 2009 @ 8:00 pm
Saturday, September 26, 2009 @ 8:00 pm
Sunday, September 27, 2009 @ 3:00 pm
Wednesday, September 30, 2009 @ 7:30 pm
Thursday, October 1, 2009 @ 7:30 pm
Friday, October 2, 2009 @ 8:00 pm
Saturday, October 3, 2009 @ 8:00 pm
Sunday, October 4, 2009 @ 3:00 pm
