All Black production team moves Richard Pryor’s story closer to Broadway

By Anare V. Holmes
producer@pridetv.org
(June 19, 2009) Peoria Stroker and OBC DreamTheatre in association with Mike Muse and Minna Mae Productions are on the grind to get UNSPEAKABLE, a play about the life of Richard Pryor, on Broadway.
A special reading featuring Loretta Devine (Hair, A Broadway Musical, Boston Public, Waiting to Exhale) will take place at 7pm. June 25th at Studio 3A at the New 42nd Street Studios in Manhattan.
Devine, our original Dreamgirl, has signed on to join the cast. Joining her in this invitation-only reading include: Paris Campbell, Michelle Wilson and James Murray Jackson, Jr., who plays Richard Pryor.
Co-written by both James Murray Jackson, Jr. and Rod Gailes OBC, UNSPEAKABLE takes "an unflinching ride through the emotional landscape of iconic comedic legend Richard Pryor.”
The iconic comedian grew up in a Peoria, Illinois brothel owned by his grandmother-- a place his mother worked as a prostitute. He would later rise to the pinnacle of success becoming one of America's most gifted comics. He'd also become equally famous for a public battle with drug addiction.
PRIDETV Executive Producer Anare Holmes recently talked to Rod Gailes OBC, who also serves as the project's director.

How did you become involved in the project?

Gailes OBC: James Murray Jackson, Jr. first had the idea of developing a one-man show on Richard Pryor several years back. He was looking for a collaborator to help with writing and other production elements.
Mutual friends introduced us and, while I was interested in the project, I told him that I really was not into doing a one-man show.
I told him I had some other ideas in mind and what later developed was a full two act play.

The play made its debut back in 2005 at the SoHo Playhouse under the title "Unspeakable: Richard Pryor Live & Uncensored, a Dramatic Fantasia. It sounds pretty ambitious.

Gailes OBC: Yes. We first premiered the project during the International Fringe Festival that year. As fate would have it, I had to make some edits and a full two act play became one, but we received a pretty favorable review in the New York Times. We believed the project had potential to eventually land on Broadway.
The play is like an inner monologue told in the mind of Richard Pryor. We call it a Dramatic Fantasia as the structure was partly inspired by the structure found in Angels in America. In Angels, the characters swirl in and out of each other's lives and dreams.

Next week’s reading with Loretta Devine marks another critical step in moving to the Great White Way. What is her involvement in the play?

Gailes OBC: Loretta Devine plays Richard Pryor’s grandmother, who was the rock of his life. She was one of our first choices to play the part and we are really excited she agreed to be part of the project.

Once the project opens, it will mark the first time an all Black production team has assembled a Broadway show. What does it feel like to be making history?

Gailes OBC: We are just trying to stay in the moment and make sure we produce a quality project.
What we've been very intentional in creating, though, is a business model that cannot be broken. We were very adamant that if financial backers wanted in on the project, they’d have to buy into the whole package: we have a black production team, a black director and of course a black leading cast.

Talk about being authentically black. What impact did Richard Pryor make on American comedy?

Gailes OBC: Richard Pryor was a game changer. When he came up, many successful comics had to be very middle of the road. People like Dick Gregory and Bill Cosby were fairly clean in their comedic delivery. Early in his career Richard tried to pattern himself after Cosby and comics of that generation.
However, it was not until he ventured out west to Berkley and began hanging out with people like Huey Newton from the Black Panther Party and others that he began to re-emerge as the Richard Pryor we’ve come to know with the whole that Nigga’s crazy persona.
He was able to flip the script by becoming successful in using a more blue humor and comedic style that borrowed from people like Redd Foxx and Moms Mabley.
Because he was authentic and real he connected with people and became sort of like a rock star. In fact, virtually every comedian that’s in the business today gives him respect for what he was able to do.