Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters by John Steptoe (adapted by Karen Abbott)
a critique by Korinn Annette Jefferies korinnannette.com
the first time I saw Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters was at Hillside High School in 2004 under the direction of Wendell Tabb. I was eight, and this was one of many plays I saw before fifth grade. I was lucky enough to grow up in Durham, where I could see Black theatre often at Hillside or North Carolina Central University. and by the time I got to sixth grade, I knew I wanted to do theatre for the rest of my life.
Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters by John Steptoe is a testament to access.
with the consent of John Steptoe’s daughter, Bweela Steptoe, there have been many different adaptations and versions of this story. it is a wonderful story about two sisters whose destinies are determined by how they treat others. generally, the costumes are beautiful, the actors are phenomenal, and the story leaves you feeling full.
Synchronicity Theatre’s production of Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters is a brand new version with new songs and new music and a new book, adapted by Karen Abbott, directed and choreographed by Taryn Janelle, with music direction by LeRell Ross.
the acting was great. music and dancing? superb.
when the show opens, the audience is drawn into the story through two sisters in some sort of conflict. their father, who we can assume to be a version of John Steptoe, settles their dispute by sharing his current project, Mufaro’s Beautiful Daughters.
when the sisters re-emerge, they are Manyara and Nyasha, Mufaro’s daughters. here, is where things began to look odd for me.
the story features sisters of two opposing temperaments. there is Nyasha, the kind, angelic sister who befriends garden snakes played by Kendra Nicole Johnson. and there is Manyara, the mean, evil sister who bullies Nyasha behind her father’s back portrayed by Ja’Siah Young.
at first, I thought I was trippin. I thought, in lowercase, “I know they didn’t make the girl with dark skin the mean sister.” but they did. and the nice sister had lighter skin.
and throughout the play, as the story goes, the nice sister is kind to everyone. her scenes are well lit and everyone is pleased with her behavior. the mean sister is, well, mean to everyone. her scenes are dark and in this rendition, her travels through the jungle are a bit scary.
to me, a Black woman, aware of colorism and the association of darkness with all things bad and wrong, the casting seemed a bit odd, particularly for the piece to be directed by Taryn Janelle, who is also a Black woman.
and the more I thought about it the more confused I got. even if it is not a director’s intention to perpetuate colorism, how responsible is the director for adjusting or correcting this?
I was thinking “well if Nyasha had dark skin and Manyara had light skin would I feel better?”
(…I mean I think so)
but I was also thinking, what would it mean for directors to consider tone when casting Black characters? is that necessary?
last year at a production of Stick Fly by Lydia R. Diamond, a white audience member asked me if the lighter Black actors were considered Black because they weren’t as dark as the Black people she thought of when she thought of Black people. but that made sense because the family in the story explicitly discusses their white ancestry.
I don’t have the answers but I’d love to continue to probe at the issue of staged colorism as it seems to be a recurring theme in Black dramatic works.
with Karen Abbott’s adaptation came a few additions to the story. there is an incredibly talented griot played by Brandin Jay who, in my humble opinion, stole the show. Jay has an immaculate voice and really showed his mastery of the role with his inviting and animated storytelling. there are two bickering villagers who offer somewhat unnecessary commentary about the attractiveness of Mufaro’s daughters and their daughters, which, to be honest, even though it’s in the title, the beauty of the daughters is really not a point of contention in the story.
like it literally doesn’t matter. in the book, there is no competition between Mufaro’s daughters and anyone else in their village. they’re beautiful yes, but being beautiful is not a competition nor is it a question, it just is.
there is also a moment where Mufaro tells Nyasha that she is not Manyara’s mother which is incredibly odd to me because why would he say that? again, this is not something that happens in the book and it asserts that Nyasha’s kindness is some sort of trauma response (because there is no mother present) and it doesn’t have to be that.
during the curtain call, I cried.
I felt so inspired after the show, just like I did at Hillside in 2004.
at Synchronicity Theatre, there is an opportunity to inspire so many Black children to follow their dreams and it all starts with access.
at Synchronicity Theatre runs until February 19, 2023