The acclaimed play “Gee’s Bend” has been likened to the works of August Wilson, America’s black Shakespeare. So imagine what the slave descendants who populate this impoverished, isolated hamlet on the Alabama River must have thought when they first came face to ivory face with young playwright Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder on Dec. 26, 2004.
“It’s exciting that so many people don’t realize I’m white,” said Wilder, a Southern girl who had come to Gee’s Bend to study one of the poorest yet most historically significant communities in the American South, one that has become internationally renowned for, of all things, its evocative and imagistic quilts.
But Wilder’s goal was not to write a historical play about quilts; rather to quilt together a patchwork of anecdotes about the remarkable women who have turned castoff clothing, old sheets and flour sacks into works of art. “I wanted to know what was going on in these women’s lives while they were making the quilts,” she said. “What stories could they tell?”
To hear them, she would need the trust of women like the now-renowned artist Mary Lee Bendolph, who regaled Wilder for a year with anecdotes that populate her play, which is being performed through April 19 by the Denver Center Theatre Company. Stories like returning from the 1965 Bloody Sunday civil rights march in Selma bloodied and beaten.
Telling those stories right has nothing to do with race. “Mary turned to me that first day and said, ‘Just write it honest,’ ” Wilder said. “That was my promise to her. I just hope my love for these women and these stories can be seen in the work.”
Gee’s (pronounced like “jeez”) Bend is located where the river bends in an “S” pattern about 20 miles southwest of Selma, across from Camden. It’s surrounded on three sides by unbridged water, and there’s just one road in and out.
Officially known as Boykin, Gee’s Bend was settled as a cotton plantation in 1816 by Joseph Gee and 18 slaves. He sold the land to a cousin, who in the winter of 1845 walked 100 more slaves there from North Carolina.
The Civil War changed little in Gee’s Bend. “They basically went from being slaves to sharecroppers,” Wilder said. By 1937, Gee’s Bend was the most concentrated black population in the South. The Rev. Renwick Kennedy, writing for Christian Century, labeled Gee’s Bend “An Alabama Africa” — a separate civilization unto itself.
One that was nearly wiped out by the Depression. But when the white supremacist who owned the land went bust, he sold it to the Roosevelt administration, which sold all 10,000 acres back to the slave families in 100-acre parcels. “That created this completely self-sufficient African-American community where everyone owned their own land,” Wilder said.
Despite poverty, there was power in land ownership. “The people of Gee’s Bend were able to become active in the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s because they couldn’t be threatened with being thrown off their land,” she said.
But because residents had to register to vote in Camden, local authorities quelled the building racial tension by simply severing ferry service to and from Gee’s Bend in 1962, which meant basic-supply trips would now require an hour’s drive. Ferry service was not resumed until 2006, and by then, this God-fearing but rabble-rousing tenant community had been largely isolated from the outside world for 190 years.
Gee’s Bend didn’t get electricity until the 1960s, telephones and running water until the 1970s. But something else remarkable had happened in 1966, when an Episcopal priest started the Freedom Quilting Bee as part of an economic stimulus for the women of Gee’s Bend.
“He had stumbled upon these quilts, and so he went out and got them contracts with Bloomingdales and Saks Fifth Avenue,” Wilder said. “Those were pattern quilts, not the ones that are famous now, but for the first time, these women were earning their own money.”
What makes the more famous Gee’s Bend quilts so remarkable, she said, are their bold designs and their strong African influences that have been passed down for generations.
“If Henri Matisse or Paul Klee were going to make a quilt, that’s what they remind me of,” Wilder said.
It was Denver Center artistic director Kent Thompson who commissioned Wilder to turn the story of Gee’s Bend into a play while he was still helming the Alabama Shakespeare Festival.
“The trick was deciding whose story to tell, and how to tell it,” said Wilder, who came back with a patchwork of emotional moments in the lives of four fictional, related women spanning 1930-2000.
“Elyzabeth is a very gifted young writer with a really strong voice for women, so it seemed like synchronicity,” said Thompson, who scheduled the play to run now in conjunction with the Denver Art Museum’s Gee’s Bend exhibit April 13-July 6.
In Wilder, he certainly found a regional voice. She was raised on a 38-foot houseboat on Alabama’s Gulf Coast until she was 8 years old.
“Every morning we’d get up and bait the crab traps and throw them over the side of the boat, then go to school and come home and pull crab traps up,” said Wilder. “Our marina was this wonderful, mystic community. You had all these aging hippies, businessmen with their boats and their mistresses, old shrimp- boat captains . . . and a few drug runners.”
Wilder is also under commission to write a new play for the DCTC. “It’s called ‘The Bone Orchard,’ and it could not be more different from ‘Gee’s Bend,’ ” she said.
“It’s about a girl named Lucy Mitchell, who wants to die a virgin martyr, but she falls in love with the boy who’s been hired to dig her grave,” she said.
It’s inspired by how the ground freezes so solidly in winter, some small northern communities must anticipate who’s going to die over the winter — and dig their graves before the ground freezes.
John Moore: 303-954-1056 or jmoore@denverpost.com
“Gee’s bend”
Family historical drama. Presented by the Denver Center Theatre Company at the Space Theatre, Denver Performing Arts Complex. Written by Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder. Directed by Kent Gash. Through April 19. 6:30 p.m. Mondays-Thursdays; 7:30 p.m. Fridays; 1:30 and 7:30 p.m. Saturdays. $36-$46 303-893-4100, all King Soopers or .
This week, Denver Post theater critic John Moore speaks with , who is appearing in the national touring production of “My Fair Lady” through April 6. (He’s also the brother of KCUV 102.3 FM DJ G. Brown).
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This week’s theater openings
“Fuddy Meers” Pulitzer-winning playwright David Lindsay-Abaire (“Rabbit Hole”) is best known for this darkly comic, bizarre comedy. The main character’s memory is erased whenever she goes to sleep. A limping, lisping, half-blind, half-deaf man in a ski mask pops out from under her bed and claims to be her brother. Zaniness ensues. Through April 6. Fine Arts Center, 30 W. Dale St., Colorado Springs, 719-634-5583 or
“Gee’s Bend” Stories of the impoverished women who create the renowned Gee’s Bend quilts. Story, Page 1D. Denver Center Theatre Company, Space Theatre,Denver Performing Arts Complex, 14th and Curtis streets, 303-893-4100 or .
“I Love a Piano” This Irving Berlin revue was birthed by Denver Center Attractions in 2002, and returns for one night only at 8 p.m. Monday, March 24. Ellie Caulkins Opera House, Denver Performing Arts Complex, 303-893-4100 or .
“My Fair Lady” National touring production of the Lerner & Loewe 50th anniversary revival, starring Christopher Cazenove and Lisa O’Hare. Through April 6. Buell Theatre, Denver Performing Arts Complex, 303-893-4100 or .
“9 Parts of Desire” Karen Slack brings nine disparate Iraqi women to life in a heartbreaking and eye-opening attempt to explore the resilience, ambitions, warmth, humor and history of women who have struggled for self-identity and liberation since long before the U.S. ever found Iraq on a map. Through April 5, in repertory with “Dar al-Harb.” TheatreWorks, 3955 Cragwood Drive, Colorado Springs, 719-262-3232 or
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“Oleanna” David Mamet’s intense, engaging drama of nasty gender politics pits a college professor against a student who has accused him of sexual misconduct. Starring Dan O’Neill and Elgin Kelley. Through April 19. The Avenue Theater, 417 E. 17th Ave., 303-321-5925 or .
“Present Future” This new comedy by Niwot’s Don Fried is in the tradition of British farce. It’s the story of a couple expecting a visit from Aunt Judy, who has given them a present — a clock in the shape of a slot machine — they don’t want displayed in their home. Through April 19. California Actors Theatre, 1250 Hover Drive, in the Twin Peaks Mall, Longmont, 303-774-1842 or .
“A Tribute to Miss Peggy Lee” Alex Ryer and Lannie Garrett, two of our most formidable chanteuses, come together for a cabaret tribute. Ryer created an indelible portrait of Edith Piaf, while Garrett’s alter ego is the popular Patsy DeCline. Featuring Garrett’s in-house orchestra quintet. Through May 3. Lannie’s Clocktower Cabaret, 16th and Arapahoe streets, 303-293-0075 or .
Complete theater listings Go to our complete list of every currently running production in Colorado, including summaries, run dates, addresses, phones and links to every company’s home page.
