Preview Performance: Berta, Berta

“Berta in Meridian and she living at ease; I'm on old Parchman, got to work or leave.” The Echo Theater Company presents the West Coast premiere of Berta, Berta a sensuous love story by Angelica Chéri that was inspired by a prison chain gang song from Parchman Farm. Andi Chapman directs for a July 19 opening, with performances continuing through August 25. There will be three Pay-What-You-Want previews on July 16, July 17 and July 18.

DeJuan Christopher and Kacie Rogers star in Chéri’s unique, magical and heart-wrenching “fictional origin story” of the song “Berta, Berta.” In 1920s Mississippi, Leroy has committed an unforgivable crime and is ready to accept his punishment: incarceration at notorious Parchman Farm. He has just one final wish before he’s caught – a chance to make amends with his long lost love, Berta. Their reunion swells from a quarrelsome conjuring of the past to an impassioned plot to escape their impending fate.

The song was incorporated by August Wilson in his play, The Piano Lesson. Chéri first came across it while watching a production, and found herself haunted by it.

“What’s so striking about ‘Berta, Berta’ is that people from all over have sung this for decades and have no idea who the man is who originated this song or who the woman is who is the subject of this song,” she explained in an interview. “Every man who sang this song had his own Berta. He had the same longing, disenfranchisement, and captivity. Where did this song come from? I had to write an origin story.”

Parchman Farm remains an infamous prison in Mississippi that the Innocence Project calls “a prison modeled after a slave plantation.” In the years following emancipation, working prisoners to literal death was so commonplace that “not a single leased convict ever lived long enough to serve a sentence of ten years or more,” wrote David M. Oshinsky in “Worse Then Slavery,” his epic history of race and punishment in the deep South. According to a recent article in the UK Guardian, Parchman was also “the site of some of the most remarkable music in American history… Singing through the turmoil was not just common but routine at Parchman, whether inmates were musicians or not.

“Berta, Berta is a beautifully written, simple love story set against the backdrop of Jim Crow,” says Chapman. “It’s poetry – a book coming to life. Love can pierce through anything.”

The creative team for Berta, Berta includes scenic designer Amanda Knehans, lighting designer Andrew Schmedake, sound designer Jeff Gardner and costume designer Wendell C. Carmichael. The production stage manager is Bianca Rickheim. Chris Fields, Kelly Beech, Marie Bland and Joy DeMichelle produce for the Echo Theater Company.

Angelica Chéri is a playwright, bookwriter and lyricist, screenwriter and poet. Her plays include Phenomenal Woman, Maya Angelou (Ensemble Theater of Houston); The Seeds of Abraham (Billie Holiday Theatre); The Sting of White Roses (National Black Theatre Festival); Crowndation (National Black Theatre); and The Wiring & the Switches (Geffen Writers Group). Angelica and collaborator Ross Baum received the Richard Rodgers Award for their musical Wanted (formerly titled Gun & Powder), which is heading to Broadway next season. Angelica is co-writer of the Highway to Heaven series reboot on the Lifetime Network and a story producer for Season 2 of the documentary television series Dear… on Apple TV+. Angelica received her BA in Theater from UCLA, MFA in Playwriting from Columbia University and MFA in Musical Theater Writing from NYU.

Founded in 1997, the Echo Theater Company has gained a reputation for producing and developing exhilarating new work. Under the artistic leadership of Chris Fields, the company has championed playwrights for more than a quarter century, producing and commissioning numerous world premieres and introducing Los Angeles to playwrights David Lindsay-Abaire, Adam Rapp and Sarah Ruhl among others. The Echo has won countless Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle, Ovation, LA Weekly and Stage Raw awards, and is frequently cited on end-of-the-year “Best of Lists” including by the Los Angeles Times and NPR affiliate KCRW 89.9 FM. The company was anointed “Best Bet for Ballsy Original Plays” by the LA Weekly and was a recipient of a “Kilroy Cake Drop” to honor its efforts to produce women and trans writers. KCRW declared that “Echo Theater Company is on a fierce journey,” and Los Angeles Times theater critic Charles McNulty wrote, “Artistic directors of theaters of all sizes would be wise to follow the [lead] of the Echo’s Chris Fields, who [is] building audience communities eager for the challenge of path-breaking plays.” In 2023, the Echo was honored with the Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle’s prestigious Margaret Harford Award for Excellence in Theatre. Last season’s productions of Dido of Idaho by Abby Rosebrock and Clarkston by Samuel D. Hunter each garnered numerous awards and were named to multiple end-of-year “Best of 2024” lists.

WHO:
• Written by Angelica Chéri
• Directed by Andi Chapman
• Starring DeJuan Christopher and Kacie Rogers
• Presented by The Echo Theater Company, Chris Fields artistic director

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