The story follows Simone, a mixed race, 14-year old girl, curious about her heritage and identity, who is unsure how to explore it. When she joins the Black History and Culture Committee with Jay and Vanessa, she begins to understand the importance of her heritage and starts advocating to include more Black History classes to the school curriculum. The more she gets involved with the club, the more her friendship with her best friend Sarah decays. After Jay gets frisked by the police who suspect him of robbery, and their proposal to change the curriculum is rejected, the club dissolves for a while. This makes Simone think more and more about the casual and systemic racism they face everyday. After a while, Simone and Sarah make up, and Simone gets Jay and Vanessa to join a school sit-in protest. They get the attention of other students and the principal finally agrees to talk about the change in the curriculum.
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Scene 16, page 47. Character: Simone, 14 years old. Simone talks about how she used to be so happy when she visited her cousin. Now, the cousin has come visit to show the video of his wedding, in which someone yells something racist at him. Now, she doesn't feel happy anymore.
Scene 14, pages 41 to 44. Simone, Jay and Vanessa
2020, Black Theatre Workshop, Montreal, Quebec
2022
Playwrights Canada Press
9780369103789
Stylized
Aunt Esther, the drama’s 287-year-old fiery matriarch, welcomes into her Hill District home Solly Two Kings, who was born into slavery and scouted for the Union Army, and Citizen Barlow, a young man from Alabama searching for a new life.
Los Angeles, 1942. The United States has entered World War II, and the patriotic spirit is running high. At the same time, racial tension in L.A. are boiling over, aggravated by the biased racism of the news media that has branded young Mexican-American men, dressed in zoot suits and the pachuco style, as criminals, thugs, and an infestation. Within this turmoil, Henry Reyna, the leader of the 38th Street Gang, is accused of murder. He and his co-defendants are set up to lose the trial, and while volunteers ardently work to overturn his conviction, Henry begins to lose hope. At the same time, the historic Zoot Suit Riots explode, where U.S. servicemen stripped young Mexican-Americans and burned their clothes in the street. If Henry is ever released, what kind of world will this young pachuco live in?
