Events
Richard Wright Centennial Celebration
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
During the weekend of April 11th-13th, 2008, The University of North Carolina will commemorate the life and work of novelist, essayist and poet Richard Wright, to mark the centennial of his birth in 1908. The Richard Wright Centennial is sponsored by the Center for the Study of the American South, Carolina Performing Arts, the College of Arts and Sciences, the Institute for the Arts and Humanities, The Paul Green Foundation, Departments of Dramatic Art, Communication Studies, History and English, with the generous support of the Music Maker Foundation and the New Traditions Theatre Company.
The Centennial Celebration: When and Where
- Staged Reading of the Paul Green Adaptation of Native Son
Saturday, April 12th at 7:30 pm at UNC’s Gerrard Hall
Free Admission, reserve tickets through the Memorial Hall Box Office at 843-3333.
Tickets available beginning on March 31st - The Richard Wright Centennial Colloquium
Sunday, April 13th at 1 pm at the University Room of the Institute for Arts and Humanities at Hyde Hall
Free Admission, all ticket inquiries through Carry Matthews at the Institute for Arts and Humanities at crmatthe@email.unc.edu - Richard Wright Centennial Commemorative
Sunday, April 13th at 7:30 pm at UNC’s Memorial Hall
Free Admission, reserve tickets through the Memorial Hall Box Office at 843-3333.
Tickets available beginning on March 31st
The Richard Wright Centennial Commemorative at Memorial Hall
The culmination of proceedings will be a special Richard Wright Centennial Commemorative, open to the public and free of charge on Sunday, April 13t at 7:30 pm at UNC’s Memorial Hall. The University is honored to have Julia Wright, daughter of Richard Wright participate in a program that will feature a dramatic narrative of Wright's life and performed readings of his work. The original production will be based on biographical and autobiographical sources and will include performed selections from Wright’s fiction and non-fiction (e.g. Native Son, “The Problem of the Hero,” “The Outsider,” "Joe Louis Uncovers Dynamite," and "Blueprint for Negro Writing"). Wright's letters, poetry, and music, along with film clips and documentary footage, will be interwoven throughout the evening's performance. Julia Wright will present a selection from her father’s last, unfinished work, A Father’s Law. The evening, co-written with Dr. Adam Versenyi and directed by Joseph Megel, will also feature scenes from Paul Green's adaptation of Native Son, a collaboration between Green and Wright undertaken in Chapel Hill in the summer of 1940; the story of this Green-Wright collaboration will be a prominent feature of the performance and a point of particular interest.
The program will feature Broadway performer Keith Randolph Smith, playwright and actor Keith Glover, Brandon Dirden, recently featured in the Playmakers Repertory Co. production of Topdog/Underdog, John Feltch, Elizabeth Lewis Corley, and members of the New Traditions Theatre Company, with aforementioned special guest Julia Wright. The program will also feature the talents of guest North Carolina blues musicians Lightnin’ Wells and John Dee Holeman.
The Richard Wright Centennial Colloquium
Wright’s contributions to literary, social, and political dialogue will be examined at the Richard Wright Centennial Colloquium at 1 o’clock in the afternoon of April 13th, hosted by the Institute for the Arts and Humanities at Hyde Hall on the UNC-CH campus. Featured at the colloquium will be Julia Wright, who will deliver her paper entitled “Richard Wright’s Premonition of Katrina in his Flood Stories,” Dr. Jerry Ward, who will deliver his paper "One Writer's Legacy: Richard Wright and Our 21st Century," and Dr. Margaret Bauer, delivering her paper entitled “Call me Paul: The Long, Hot Summer of Paul Green and Richard Wright” by Dr. Margaret D. Bauer.
Respondents will include author Dr. Trudier Harris, Distinguished Professor of English and Comparative Literature, Drs. Randall Kenan and Mae Henderson, Professors of English and Comparative Literature, and will be moderated by Dr. Laurence Avery, Professor of English and Comparative Literature, all of UNC-CH.
Stage Reading of the Paul Green adaptation of Native Son at Gerrard Hall
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| Richard Wright and playwright Paul Green |
On Saturday, April 12th, 7:30 pm at Gerrard Hall, the Centennial celebration will present a staged reading, also free of charge, of Carolina alumnus and noted playwright Paul Green’s adaptation of Native Son, the revision of the original collaboration between Green and Wright undertaken in Chapel Hill during the summer of 1940. The reading will prominently feature the New Traditions Theater Company.
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