Marvin X Notes on BAMFEST 2019: Monday Night Drama at the Flight Deck

Don't miss this rare appearance by West Oakland raised internationally known and honored poet/author Marvin X. He will read and sign his latest book Notes of Artistic Freedom Fighter Marvin X. Growing up in West Oakland, Marvin attended McFeely Elementary and Prescott, also Lowell Jr. High, later Oakland City College (Merritt) with Bobby Seale and Huey Newton, founders of the Black Panther Party. Marvin is a co-founder of the West Coast and National Black Arts Movement.

He obtained his B.A. and M.A. in English/Creative Writing. He's taught at Fresno State University, University of California Berkeley and San Diego, Mills College, San Francisco State University and the University of Nevada, Reno, and elsewhere.

He's received writing awards from Columbia University, National Endowment for Arts and planning grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Marvin X Notes  

Oakland's BAMFEST 2019

Monday Night Drama 

at the Flight Deck

1540 Broadway

Downtown Oakland

2/18/19

Black Arts Movement Business District

Oakland California

The Black Arts Movement Business District BAMFEST 2019 presented three solo theatre pieces tonight: Thomas Robert Simpson's Courage Under Fire: The Story of Elroy; Glory by Dr. Ayodele Nzinga and Voice of the Voiceless by Nisa De'lovely. The evening at the Flight Deck began with Nisa's poetic monologue on the theme of female sex abuse and exploitation. It is the narrative of many women in this #Metoo Era. Our Black Arts West Theatre presented Papa's Daughter by Dorothy Ahmad on this theme in 1966.

Marvin X and Danny Glover

photo Ken Johnson

Danny was an actor in Marvin X's Black Arts West Theatre, Fillmore Street, San Francisco CA, 1966. They were both students at San Francisco State University.

Danny Glover began his career at Black Arts West as Papa who had a sexual relationship with his daughter, a role that undoubtedly prepared Danny for Alice Walker's Color Purple. When we participated in the Crack Cocaine Recovery Program at San Francisco's Glide Church, the majority of the female Crack addicts testified they were sexually abused by fathers, mothers, uncles, aunts, brothers, sisters before succumbing to drug addiction and prostitution. Voice of the Voiceless was a dramatic narrative on this theme that has been revealed as a pervasive pathology in the North American African sojourn. Nisa De'lovely did a great job telling her story experienced by so many women today, from Color Purple to Vagina Monologues, and even Ayodele Nzinga's Glory touched on the subject. 

Nisa De'lovely is Voice of  the Voiceless

What disturbs me most is the entire history of sexual debauchery during and after North American African enslavement in the American system of dehumanization. Why should we not expect the horror of sexual pathology to permeate our culture as oppressed people, after all, did not the slave master have free rein at all African bodies, women, men and children, including his own? Nisa told her story and exited the stage with good-bye. Her message was clear that human beings are more than sexual organs and we need to rise up from the low information vibration, yes, black women matter, black lives matter and #metoo matters. 

Thomas Simpson recounts radical evolution of his family

from Civil War to Civil Rights

Thomas Simpson's solo piece was a great and wonderful family narrative of how North American African families survived the worst treatment any human beings ever experienced in the history of the world. He told how his family endured our communal suffering but participated in the Civil War and the Civil Rights struggle. His great grandfather's name is on the statute honoring the 200,000 North American warriors who fought and were decisive  in winning the Civil War and his sisters were Freedom Riders in the Civil Rights era. We had no idea Thomas Simpson came from such a grand genealogy. We thought he was a San Francisco Negro doing drama. He is founder of the San Francisco Afro-Solo Theatre Festival--we had no idea of his radical roots until enjoying his story of Elroy, his father. His video effects of family and North American African history  in this wilderness were excellent archival images revealing his family's participation  in the matrix of our 400 year liberation struggle and recorded narrative. We enjoyed his dramatic monologue and the images solidified his narrative. 

The evening ended with Glory by Dr. Ayodele Nzinga, founder of the Lower Bottom Playaz and Producer of BAMFEST. Of course, she is my star student after enrolling in my  Theatre class at Laney College, 1981. All teachers appreciate seeing their student mature and evolve into greatness as Ayodele has done. Glory is a dramatic narrative of her family history, totally dysfunctional as are most of our family histories, alas, we were not kidnapped and sold into the American slave system (Ed Howard term) to have "normal" families, hence we suffer generational psycho-social pathologies--and in the words of ancestor James Baldwin in my 1968 interview at his apartment in NYC, "It's a wonder we all haven't gone stark raving mad."

Glory recounts the roots of Ayodele's family, but most importantly her survival and thrival to be a multi-talented Theatre Grand Diva, Black Diva Warrior Queen, in residence at the Flight Deck Theatre on Oakland's Broadway. She narrates in her inimitable dramatic manner of portraying multiple personalities as she is known to do in her presentations. In Glory, she is simultaneously grandmother, mother and daughter. As producer, director, actor, playwright, Ayo has fulfilled the dreams she told her mother in Glory, a mother who derided her to the most detrimental degree any parent can  do to destroy the dreams of a child.

Thank you Ayodele Nzinga for catching the Black Arts Movement baton. We know Amiri Baraka is smiling on you. For sure, you teacher is proud of you!

--Marvin X/El Muhajir

2/18/19

 Left to Right: Dr. Ayodele Nzinga and her Master Teacher Marvin X

Flight Deck Theatre

1540 Broadway

Downtown Oakland

In Residence 

The Lower Bottom Playaz

founder and director

Dr. Ayodele Nzinga

Dr. Nzinga's Lower Bottom Playaz is the only theatre company in the world to perform August Wilson's ten play cycle in chronological order. 

August Wilson

by James Gayles

Please Note

Iconic artist James Gayles of Oakland CA has generously donated this portrait of America’s Shakespeare, August Wilson, to Oakland’s premiere North American African Theater Troupe, The Lower Bottom Playaz, to help fund their historic production of his seminal work The American Century Cycle. The work is for sale by auction with an opening bid of $1800.00. Please send all inquires to wordslanger@gmail.com

Master Teacher Marvin X and his star student Dr. Ayodele Nzinga, founder of the Lower Bottom Playaz and Producer of the Black Arts Movement District Festival BAMFEST 2019. 

Cover art by Black Arts Movement Master Artist and Playwright Ben Caldwell

On Wednesday, February 20, 6PM 
You are cordially invited
to the 
Blue Dream
West Oakland honors
West Oakland raised international poet/author/activist
Marvin X (Jackmon)

Dr. Ayodele Nzinga will honor 

Her Master Teacher 
Marvin X 

Co-founder of the West Coast, National Black Arts Movement 

and Oakland's Black Arts Movement Business District 

along the 14th Street Corridor 

approved by the Oakland City Council

January 19, 2016

The Blue Dream

1300 7th Street, West Oakland 

presents 

An Evening With Marvin X

reading and signing 

his latest book 

Notes of Artistic Freedom Fighter Marvin X

Poet/Playwright Marvin X

photo Kamau Amen Ra (RIP)

Poet/playwright/director/producer/educator/organizer/planner/historian/philosopher

grew up on the streets of West Oakland, attended McFeely, Prescott and Lowell Jr. High,

attended Oakland City College (Merritt) with Huey Newton and Bobby Seale. Huey Newton said, "Marvin X was my teacher, many of our comrades came from his black arts movement theatre, e.g., Bobby Seale, Eldridge Cleaver, Emory Douglas, George Murray, Samuel Napier, et al." Bobby Seale says, "After Marvin X performed his play Flowers for the Trashman at the invitation of the Soul Students Advisory Council (BSU), the black liberation struggle ignited at OCC or Merritt. His play showed us the powerful role of art in the liberation struggle."