HSC’s “Sheila’s Day” glorious musical history

WEST HARTFORD — A vibrant, informative, and ultimately uplifting civil rights history lesson set to music is in store for you at the Hartford Stage production of the glorious “Sheila’s Day” at Roberts Theatre on the Kingswood-Oxford School campus.
This 90-minute show, originally produced at the Crossroads Theatre Company in New Brunswick, New Jersey, bursts with life, love, rhythm, and song, with everything from blues to gospel to fabulous South African ululation and songs.
The Hartford Stage Company’s theater in Hartford is being remodeled with additional trap doors beneath the stage, new heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning systems, and probably most welcome of all, much needed expanded restrooms.
South African playwright and musician Mbongeni Ngema originally conceived “Sheila’s Day” to honor his mother, a South African domestic worker. In South Africa, maids are often referred to as “Sheilas” by their white employers, despite their native names.
The concept eventually evolved to include the United States civil rights movement and smoothly, interestingly balances the painful, often horrific parallel stories of mob hatred and violence against blacks in both countries.
Scenes such as the Freedom Rider bus that was bombed in 1961 in Alabama; the four black students who demanded to be served at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina in 1960; and Rosa Parks refusal to give up her seat to whites on a Montgomery, Alabama bus in 1955 were intermingled with South African protests and other atrocities.
Perhaps less familiar to some, but informative, was the 1956 Pretoria, South Africa boycott where 20,000 women protested the extending of passes to African women. Also reenacted is the 1972 incident at Cape Town, Johannesburg where white authorities push activist and writer Mthuli Shezi in front of a moving train for defending Black women at the Germiston Station.
Often when actors play composite characters they become one dimensional, but that is not the case with this truly talented ensemble of 10 performers, lead by Ann Duquesnay as Ruby Lee and Thuli Dumakude as the South African Qedusizi.
Dumakude is also the show’s musical director.
Their harmonies are gorgeous, making the pain of their stories only slightly less overwhelming. Thankfully there are some comic-relief bits, such as when Ashley Bryant as Stephanie flirts with the southern wives’ husbands at night, and then shows up at church the following day, looking for forgiveness from those same wives.
There’s also some fun and light-hearted interaction with the audience — but don’t worry, no one gets pulled up onto the stage.
The show drags a bit in the beginning, but once the singers get warmed up, they hit their stride and fly.
“Sheila’s Day” is a blessed opportunity to become immersed in two rich cultures and is an enriching experience worth every step of the journey. And at 90 minutes without an intermission it is just the right length.

SHEILA'S DAY

4 Stars
Location: Hartford Stage Company at Kingswood-Oxford School’s Roberts Theatre, 170 Kingswood Rd., West Hartford.
Production: Conceived and written by Duma Ndlovu. Directed by Ricardo Khan. Co-created with Mbongeni Ngema, with additional material by Ebony Jo-Ann. Music direction by Thuli Dumakude. Lighting design by Victor En Yu Tan. Costume design by Sasha Ehlers.
Running time: 90 minutes with no intermission.
Show Times: Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays at 7:30 p.m., Friday and Saturday at 8 p.m., with matinee performances Sundays and selected Wednesdays and Saturdays at 2 p.m. through Aug. 15.
Tickets: $23 — $66. Call 860-527-5151 or visit their website at www.hartfordstage.org.
ACTOR…CHARACTER
Thuli Dumakude … Qedusizi
Ann Duquesnay … Ruby Lee
Tu Nokwe … Tu
Natalie Venetia Belcon … Annelen
Carla Brothers … Carla
Ashley Bryant … Stephanie
Erin Cherry … Valerie
Chantal Jean-Pierre … Torres
Taifa Harris … Breedlove
Julia Lema … Irene