BSA Sponsors Play to Promote Black History

By Broadside Staff Reporter Emily Sharrer

In honor of Black History Month, the Black Student Alliance is bringing to campus a play by Pin Points Theater, a Washington, D.C.-based company that promotes the intellectual accomplishments of Africans and African-Americans.

Tomorrow, the BSA is sponsoring “The Meeting,” a free play that focuses on “what would have happened if Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. had met before they were both gunned down in a hail of bullets, just three years apart,” according to the group’s website. The play has received many awards, including a Louis B. Mayer Award, eight NAACP Theater Awards and six New York Audience Development Committee Inc. nominations.

This will be shown at 7 p.m. in Dewberry Hall.

According to BSA President Tiffany Reaves, the events of the play will be as much of a surprise to planners as to audience members. Pin Points Theater will only reveal certain details of the act. Reaves is sure, however, that the play will be an interesting show for students.

“We know basically what you guys know,” Reaves said. “As everybody knows they [Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X] have met before, but this is kind of a conversation they didn’t have, it’s an interesting take on the views between the two. It’s going to be interesting to see how it all plays out.”

This is the second time the BSA has brought a play to campus for Black History Month. Last year, a theater company from New York presented a play called “Platanos and Collard Greens,” which was a popular event, Reaves said.

“It was about the relationship between Hispanics and African-Americans. It was a really good show and a lot of people came out,” Reaves said. “We try to get plays that are educational, but informational and fun at the same time.”

Reaves, who was the treasurer for BSA last year, was interested in bringing another play to campus since last year’s response was so great. Ultimately, Reaves wants to create an annual tradition of bringing a play to campus for Black History Month.

“We didn’t know a lot of people were going to show up [last year]. We had to end up getting more chairs in Dewberry Hall,” Reaves said. “It was a really good play and people enjoyed it so we’re hoping for the same thing this year. We do want to make it an annual thing, bringing a different play every single year, because they’re fun and people come out to them.”

In planning this event, Reaves had help from Calvin Haney, assistant director in the Diversity and Human Services Department and the advisor to BSA.

Both Reaves and Haney played an important part in planning and are happy to be able to bring a play of this caliber to Mason, despite some initial financial setbacks. The group was short $975 when the social programming fund was unable to provide the group with the necessary funds.

“I asked the African-American Studies Department and they gave us the whole $975 left that we needed,” Reaves said. “They were extremely helpful because if they wouldn’t have given us the money, we couldn’t have done the play, so they were definitely very instrumental in this.”

This year, Reaves is hoping for another large turnout.

“I’m expecting a huge turnout because Calvin [Haney, Assistant Director in the Diversity and Human Services Department and BSA’s advisor] is sending out e-mails to different people in the community, not just Mason,” Reaves said. “Hopefully a lot of people will just be interested in the title. It’s about MLK and Malcolm X, so hopefully that will get a lot of people out.”

Reaves is now looking forward to bringing the importance of Black History Month to students at Mason.

“Black History Month is a huge event for Mason because there’s not a lot of minority-headed student organizations on campus. We’re going to pass out pamphlets about the two [Martin Luther King, Jr. and Malcolm X] so students can learn more about them and their views. It’s to benefit everybody, we’re not asking for any donations, it’s free to get in. We’re just wanting everybody to learn basically and have fun,” Reaves said.

Each October, the BSA kicks off the year with an event called “The Source,” which was held in Dewberry Hall with participants from Orange County High School last fall.

“‘The Source’ is where minority organizations on campus can pass out information and get people to know about their events,” Reaves said. “We also brought OCHS students and we had a campus tour and lunch for them and stickers for them because they are high schoolers and they’re at poverty level so we wanted to let them see that college is a reality for them.”

The BSA also put on a barbecue at the beginning of the term and has movie nights from time to time, according to Reaves; however, the play seems to draw in the largest number of Mason students.

If you are interested in becoming a member of the BSA, contact Tiffany Reaves at treaves@gmu.edu.