Actress re-enacts African American history through a performance of song, dance, and dialogue.
By Dominic Dang
Photos by Chris Dang
Actress Tatiana Williams from the Mixed Blood Theatre performed, “The Daughters of Africa,” a re-enactment of American black women throughout history, highlighting their successes and struggles. The performance was on Feb.16 at the Coon Rapids campus Legacy Room.
Williams took the audience on a blast-to-the-past aboard the make-believe Legacy Airlines, where as our pilot and navigator she brought us on a journey through black women’s history.
Our first landing took us back into the late 1800s, with a lady dressed in a red bandana and raggedy clothing. This was a time where slaves had their feet chopped if they were caught trying to run away and were banned from speaking and writing in their native language, or they’d lose their tongues.
It was an epic journey through history all the way up to modern day history. One character Williams re-enacted was Harriet Tubman. She portrayed a crazy old lady, distracting white men while she was secretly leading waves of black people to freedom. It felt so immersive as Williams actually got bent over like an old lady, singing crazy old songs and dancing like nobody’s business. This is just a small snippet of the many different roles and characters Williams had to re-enact.
Between eras of history, Williams, as our plane navigator touched on many the actions and events through dialogue, highlighting women’s successes who were firsts of their kind, including woman’s rights activist Sojourner Truth, newspaper writer Ida B. Wells, and the first black millionaire, Madam C. J. Walker.
The show was accompanied with singing and dancing by Williams herself, singing famous songs from celebrities such as Billie Holiday. Williams branched out into some modern history such as portraying Oprah Winfrey, who she stated was, “more than a talk show host, but a facilitator of dreams.”
After the show, she led a Q & A session with the audience about herself and the performance. Someone from the audience asked her if she had ever been insulted at one of her shows.
“Girl yes, so many times,” said Williams.
Williams had other comments in reference to the past.
“All of us have a history. To know when you we going, you have to knew your past,” said Williams.
The show has been touring around the Midwest since 1992, however Williams told the audience that this was this was the last performance of this show. If she were to add more, she said that the show would involve a lot more modern history.
Williams is a 28-year-old B.F.A. graduate from the California Institute of Arts. She’s also had additional training from the Royal Scottish Academy of Music, Drama, and Dance located in Glasgow, Scotland.
