Ideals and Cruel 'Things' ; Hope of Worker Communism Clashes with Southern Reality

Summary

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With productions of "Animal Farm" and "The Director: The Third Act of Elia Kazan" currently going on around town, Washington-area theaters have been painting the town red. Add Baltimore's Center Stage to the list of comrades, with playwright Naomi Wallace's "Things of Dry Hours," a poetic, romantic and politically explosive look at the role of Southern blacks in the American communist movement of the 1930s.

Turns out Birmingham, Ala., in 1932 was not so far removed from Red Square, with black men and women railing against the Tennessee Coal and Iron conglomerate and the union-busting efforts of U.S. corporations. The communists made racial justice a priority in America, and black party members combined religion and radical fervor in what was known as a working-class version of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Of course, everything was conducted in secret, since black party members were hounded by both the Klan and union henchmen.

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Extract

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Ideals and Cruel 'Things' ; Hope of Worker Communism Clashes with Southern Reality

Until the civil rights movement of the 1950s, the American Communist Party was one of few national organizations not only fighting for racial equality, but also one of the rare g...

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