Spunk
Director: Tamilla Woodard
Choreographer: nicHi Douglas
New Songs, Arrangement and Music Supervisor; Nehemiah Luckett
Music Director: John Bronston
Lighting Designer: Gib Gibney
Costume Designer: Kristen Taylor
Sound Designer: Justin Ellington
Projection Designer: Ke Xu 许可
Technical Director: Tom Minucci
Written by Zora Neale Hurston based on her own short story. Spunk premiered at Yale Repertory Theatre. A railroad bends inward inviting Spunk and the audience into the world, as the curtain rises. We enter Eatonville, Florida in the 1930’s. A lot of inspiration came from Zora Neale’s written work. We were encourage to always meet her, as it is her presence and her roots that activate the play. In her stories trees and nature constantly surround her and her characters.
The trees in Spunk take a lot of different meanings from engulfing the community into a hug , a place they carved out for themselves, and a love confirmation from Evalina to Spunk in the shape of a magnolia flower. The realness of the trees contrasted with the flatness of Joe’s was used to highlight older theatrical conventions that Zora Neale Hurston would have been surrounded by in her time.
