The Colored Museum

Themes

Identity

Race

Madness

" The shackles of the past have been defied by Mr. Wolfe's fearless humor, and it's a most liberating revolt." —NY Times

The Griot Project proudly presents The Colored Museum by George Wolfe and directed by William Mack III. The Colored Museum has electrified, discomforted, and delighted audiences of all colors, redefining our ideas of what it means to be black in contemporary America. Its eleven "exhibits" undermine black stereotypes old and new and return to the facts of what being Black means.

Identity

The themes of Identity run deep in this play. We find that each exhibit challenges some part of who we perceive ourselves to be. Not just the identity of Blackness. But sexual identity, manhood, femininity, faith, morality, heroism and victimhood. The madness that runs through the play comes out when the characters identity runs afoul of their realities- when circumstances force the removal of their mask.

Race

We chose this play to follow Day of Absence specifically to complete the train of thought. Day of Absence helped us explore “what do we do when Blackness is absent?” The Colored Museum forces us to confront how we manage the Blackness that is ever present with us. Both explore the idea of race as a mask. Day of Absence in a much more literal way that subverts the expectations of a play about an all white town by featuring Black actors, and The Colored Museum in a much more layered and nuance way that deconstructs the masks that make up the outward facing expression of Blackness we wear every day.