Minstrel Show, or the Lynching of William Brown at Middletown Arts Center

Written by Max Sparber and directed by Darrell Lawrence Willis, Sr., this compelling production re-creates the horrific, true story of the 1919 lynching of a jailed black man, William Brown, as seen through the eyes of a couple of traveling, fictional song-and-dance men. The production stars Joseph G. Taylor and Arthur Gregory Pugh.Max Sparber has taken a shameful, little-noted event in American history and created an engrossing work that seems as socially relevant today as when the harrowing lynching transpired in 1919. The play begins with two fictional, minstrel characters entertaining the audience with songs from the cotton fields. Fate has found the two jailed for disturbing the peace in the Douglas County Courthouse in Omaha, Nebraska along-side William Brown, who is awaiting trial for molesting a 19-year-old white woman. The lightheartedness of the play quickly turns as the minstrels launch into the shockingly, graphic recollection of an angry, 5,000-person mob dragging Brown from the courthouse, then shooting, lynching and burning him before dragging his body through the streets.