Interview Uprooted Theatre brings new voices to the stage

A lot of arts groups started up in 2009, but one of the most talked-about was Uprooted Theatre. Formed by four young theater professionals, Uprooted is one of Milwaukee's first African American theater companies since the venerable Hansberry-Sands Theatre Company. Uprooted promises to explore "African-American voices and cultural experiences" and "unite all members of the Milwaukee community," The company aims to produce three staged readings and three full productions each year. Its first full production, Marti Gobel's one-woman show Beauty's Daughter and last fall's variety show fund-raiser, Against Type, attracted talents from across the spectrum of Milwaukee theater. Uprooted's next show, a staged reading of Tennessee Williams' A Streetcar Named Desire, will take place January 25 at the Tenth Street Theater. The A.V. Club talked with Uprooted's artistic director, Dennis F. Johnson, about the show and the troupe's vision.

The A.V. Club: What drew you to A Streetcar Named Desire?

Dennis F. Johnson: It was really a selfish choice. I've always loved Tennessee Williams, and it gave us a chance to do age-appropriate casting. Travis [Knight] is Stanley, Marti [Gobel] is playing Blanche. Everyone thinks Blanche is an old lady, because she calls herself an old maid, but really, she's not. Stanley's actually just 25. Plus, there's the name recognition of the play. We have a really good multiethnic cast, which I think works well in the setting of New Orleans and the whole conglomeration of people that New Orleans is.

AVC: How did you come up with your mission statement?

DFJ: Well, Milwaukee has such a high percentage of African Americans, and in general there's not a lot of outlets for their voices to be heard in theater. A lot of companies do make a conscious effort to colorblind cast, and to cast roles they feel they could be played by black actors. But I don't think it's telling the stories that the community wants to hear. That's how we came to that. As far as bringing communities together—just looking at the way Milwaukee is set up geographically, it's so segregated it's almost laughable. It's like somebody put on a map: This is where this culture's going to live, this is where this group's going to live, and it's really stuck like that. So we're hoping that through art and including people of all races, and not casting based on race or gender or sexuality or anything like that, that we really can bring people together, and show people that theater is for everyone, and everyone's story has a right to be heard.

AVC: How will you bring new audiences to the theater?

DFJ: We have some general ideas and some sort of show-by-show ideas. With Beauty's Daughter, because it was so much spoken word, we brought in Dana Thurman, who's a spoken word artist, to open the show. And she, in turn, took us to spoken-word events she was performing at and introduced us, and a lot of the people from those events came to the show—most of whom said they'd never been to live theater before. None had even been to the Broadway Theater Center before—they just didn't know about it. We're going to be doing a lot of education. Travis is heading that up; we're actually starting our first educational outreach in the next few weeks, going into some schools, getting to know the kids, teaching them what theater is and why it's important.

Between the four of us, we've all been around. We just made connections. The theater really is a community, and as long as you're a good person, and egos don't get in the way, people are more than willing to help. That being said, once they read the mission statement and heard what we were doing and why, they realized there was a void that needed to be filled. We've been super lucky that way.