{"id":126048,"date":"2025-08-07T10:06:30","date_gmt":"2025-08-07T10:06:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/126048\/"},"modified":"2025-08-07T10:06:30","modified_gmt":"2025-08-07T10:06:30","slug":"remembering-black-dallas-highlights-icons-of-local-history-in-revived-theater-production","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/126048\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering Black Dallas highlights icons of local history in revived theater production"},"content":{"rendered":"

The historian group Remembering Black Dallas (RBD) is bringing eight prominent Black Dallasites back to life with Living Museum, a docudrama that blends research and performance to honor the city\u2019s Black legacy.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not a play that looks down on any race or group of people,\u201d director Selmore Haines said. \u201cIt just celebrates the accomplishments of African Americans. And that should be maintained and should be celebrated.\u201d<\/p>\n

The show highlights prominent figures such as Texas\u2019 first Black dentist, Marcellus Cooper, civil rights activist George Porter and educator Fannie C. Harris. Most of the featured figures were living in the late 19th century; some were born slaves. The audience will get to go through their powerful storylines and obstacles they overcame.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you would imagine going to a wax museum and seeing a display of a certain character, imagine that character comes to life before your eyes and tells their story,\u201d Haines said.<\/p>\n

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This marks the second premiere of Living Museum, which Remembering Black Dallas founder George Keaton first developed in 2020 as a research project to help RBD members learn more about key figures from the city\u2019s Black history. Keaton wrote monologues from the perspective of historical figures and asked Haines to perform them at the end of RBD\u2019s Ukunika bus tours through Dallas. <\/p>\n

The project evolved into a stage production after Keaton envisioned using theater to portray multiple historical figures in one setting. He compiled all six written monologues and held the first showing in the South Dallas Cultural Center\u2019s 110-seat black box theater, where it sold out for two nights in a row. <\/p>\n

Keaton died in 2022. Remembering Black Dallas is reviving the show at the Dallas College\u2019s Mountain View Performance Hall in an effort to combat the erasure of Black history. Haines said he hopes young people will attend to strengthen the foundation of their history.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of the lines in the play says, if we don\u2019t know where we come from, we don\u2019t really have a clear path on where we\u2019re going,\u201d Haines said.<\/p>\n

Details <\/b><\/p>\n

Aug 15-16 at Dallas College Mountain View Campus Performance Hall, 4849 W. Illinois Ave. $20 for adults, $10 for kids under 18. <\/b>www.rememberingblackdallas.org<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

Arts Access is an arts journalism collaboration powered by The Dallas Morning News and KERA.<\/p>\n

This community-funded journalism initiative is funded by the Better Together Fund, Carol & Don Glendenning, City of Dallas OAC, Communities Foundation of Texas, The University of Texas at Dallas, The Dallas Foundation, Eugene McDermott Foundation, James & Gayle Halperin Foundation, Jennifer & Peter Altabef and The Meadows Foundation. The News and KERA retain full editorial control of Arts Access\u2019 journalism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The historian group Remembering Black Dallas (RBD) is bringing eight prominent Black Dallasites back to life with Living…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":126049,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5135],"tags":[5229,347,11321,7711,1596,358,1148,3187,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-126048","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-dallas","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-article","10":"tag-arts-entertainment","11":"tag-arts-access","12":"tag-dallas","13":"tag-texas","14":"tag-theater","15":"tag-tx","16":"tag-united-states","17":"tag-united-states-of-america","18":"tag-unitedstates","19":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","20":"tag-us","21":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114986928306376022","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126048","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=126048"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126048\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/126049"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=126048"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=126048"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=126048"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}