Ladies and Gentlemen,

Let us present to you our first potential theater space:

This is the stage at Lighthouse Community Church presented to us by Reverend Lemar A. Tabb.

After the service that morning, we had a chance to speak to the Reverend about our research. When we mentioned we were interested in starting a theater, his eyes lit up and he immediately took us to see the stage. The audience area can seat 300 people (challenge accepted). 27 church goers showed up this morning leaving the seats about 1/4th full. Reverend Tabb noted if his full congregation showed, the space would be packed.

The church service itself was truly an amazing experience.

We walked into church a bit late (we were ready to leave on time; Kirk got in the shower five minutes before the service was supposed to start).

An alleyway on the way to Lighthouse

As we walked in, heads turned to see who it was, obviously; but they stayed turned (and turned again) as they noticed us accompanying Kirk into the sanctuary.

Kirk commented later: “The most segregated time in Detroit is between 10 and 11 on Sunday mornings.”

Even with that, we perceived that the congregation eagerly accepted us as part of their community. And the sense of community was very strong: they had a part of the service called “hug time” when the congregation hugged and/or shook hands; later we got up and stood in a circle, singing and praying while holding hands. Very wonderful.

Kirk did us a great service bringing us to church.

The Reverend was very open with us in our conversation after the service. “The racial divide in this city is great, so you have to be able to relate to them. You have to be cool, they have to feel you.”

Kirk mentioned exposure to the arts (or lack thereof) as an issue: “in elementary school we had auditorium class. We put on plays, we did speeches, we listened to radio — Peter and the Wolf…what does that have to do with now? They took it away. The first thing we do here in Detroit when there are financial difficulty is take away the arts. It’s terrible!”

He went on to say “You know, I liked the arts. I was in plays…but if my friends knew they’d say “you in a play? You a punk!” But I was in football so I’d say “really? You think so?”” then they’d back off.

“I wrote a play. But I had to write it in a way that the kids could read it, because we have some trouble with reading in our African-American kids.”

I (Rory) am very interested in the educational aspects of public outreach. Kirk would be an amazing resource and we are in the process of gaining more of those contacts.

“Heyo Ryan, let’s go check out them flowers”

After church, we made our way back over to the Eastern Market for Flower Day, which is attended by more than 200,000 people. We stumbled into a fashion show sponsored by the clothing company, Detroit Hustles Harder (I’m totally buying a shirt).

According to one of the founders, the name reflects the need for Detroiters to work harder than most to make ends meet. It started off as a T-shirt design and has blossomed into a way of life.

The coolest part was how they delineated the runway with potted flowers.

We then ran into a lady named Kathy Lightbody who knows a LOT of people. Her husband recently gave up his job as a Marine to sell flowers. Yeah, that sentence is free of typos. “In Detroit it’s easy to get lucky — well, you have to be ready for the opportunity obviously, but here there are way more opportunities, therefore it’s easier to get lucky.” She herself does not leave it all to luck.

She works as a Brand Communications Director at Automotive News, helps her husband with his business and owns an apartment building in Midtown (those are just the things we got notes on). Kathy Hustles Hard.

She had this to say about Dan Gilbert’s work: “it’s an umbrella under which smaller businesses have more opportunities that they otherwise would. I mean, I can open a coffeeshop in my building but I can’t build a stadium to bring thousands of people into the area.”

Prey Mantis eggs, anybody? 

“Not a lot scares me, I grew up in Detroit”

We then made our way over to a play reading at the home of Sally Jane Kerschen-Sheppard, a formerly NY-based playwright who heads up a local group of playwrights who read and discuss each other’s work every Sunday. Eleven people including R&R attended the reading. She also heads up Blue Field Writers House, a residence that provides of a writer’s basic needs giving them “uninterrupted time to write”. She also teaches yoga at Be Nice Yoga and works the box office at Cinema Detroit. Sally Hustles Hard.

Sally with snacks

We were welcomed very warmly by all in attendance, none of whom we had met — except for Brian Cox, the playwright we met at Inland Press (who got us the invite to the reading — thanks, Brian).

Brian Cox – he’s the man.

So we read the work-in-progress play by Sean Paraventi; we can’t say much about it except that it is full of fun reversals and female lead is from Detroit (the heading is one of her lines).

Sean Paraventi – Actor, Playwright

We then spent about an hour and a half discussing it. The discussion had a series of rules, all of which boiled down to “this is a safe place; only constructive, respectful critique allowed”. This is standard practice among the writing community.

The take-away here is that they knew and adhered to professional standards of critique. And the discussion was very rich: we discussed tone, flow, character motivation, and other specific aspects of writing. It was a very heartening experience.

We spoke to all of the people present about the scene in Detroit, all of whom seemed very positive and encouraging.

However, most people we meet do not sugarcoat the situation: pulling in an audience will be difficult. Sally shared an interesting perspective saying that Detroit theatre people tell themselves two falsehoods. One: They need more money to do the work / they can’t get an audience. Two: Because of lack of money they have to protect what’s theirs. This turns into cliquishness and exclusivity, especially between the smaller companies.

I cited the smaller companies’ general auditions in which representatives from several companies come together so that actors only have to audition once. According to Sean, though, less than half the companies were represented in his audition.

Sally wrote an article for Next City Magazine in December, 2014 claiming that her expenses in Detroit are comparable to what she paid living in New York City; the only difference is distribution (maybe the mortgage/rent is cheaper, but property taxes and insurance are more expensive).

It is important to get many different viewpoints — our thesis question is open-ended for a reason. Our next goal is to get hard, concrete data supporting or contesting these perspectives. We are seeking complexity in the research; might as well, we’re here for a month.

Thanks for diving in with us!

Much love,

R&R

Ended the night with the best tacos in town – El Taco Veloz thanks, Grecia Jimenez!