A new stage adaptation of Harriet Jacobs’ 1861 autobiography, “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl” will be performed at 7:30 p.m., Tuesday, March 24, 2015 in the Recital Hall, Performing Arts Center on the University at Albany’s uptown campus. A pre-performance discussion will be held at 7:00 p.m., and a post-performance discussion will conclude the show. A Literature to Life stage presentation of Young Audiences New York, the event is sponsored by UAlbany’s Performing Arts Center and the New York State Writers Institute. Advance tickets are $15 general public; $10 seniors, UAlbany faculty/staff, and students. Box Office: (518) 442-3997; ticke
Commissioned by The New York Historical Society in 2006, and developed by American Place Theatre, “Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl” is a verbatim adaptation of the autobiography of Harriet Jacobs (1813-1897), an escaped slave, abolitionist, writer, and educator. While illuminating in shocking fashion the traumas of slavery, particularly for women and children, the book is an inspiring tale of resilience and survival. Directed by Wynn Handman, Cherita Armstrong stars in this account of the author’s seven years spent hiding out as a fugitive in “The Loophole,” a crawl space in her grandmother’s attic where she could neither sit nor stand, in order to protect her children in an effort to ensure their eventual freedom.
Actor Armstrong is a native New Yorker and a graduate of Utica College of Syracuse University. She has performed at numerous theatres including Manhattan Class Company, Ensemble Studio Theatre, New York Theatre Workshop, Yale Repertory Theatre, St. Louis Black Repertory Company, Public Theatre in Maine, and Baltimore Center Stage. Her television and film credits include Law & Order: SVU, Law & Order: Trial by Jury, All My Children, and many national and regional commercials.
Other productions of the “Literature to Life” series that have been featured at the UAlbany Performing Arts Center in association with the NYS Writers Institute have included Sherman Alexie’s “Flight,” Sue Monk Kidd’s “The Secret Life of Bees,” Frank McCourt’s “Teacher Man,” Greg Mortenson’s “Three Cups of Tea,” Jeannette Walls’ “The Glass Castle,” Junot Diaz’s “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao,” Khaled Hosseini’s “The Kite Runner,” Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried,” Lois Lowry’s “The Giver,” Richard Wright’s “Black Boy” and Lemon Andersen’s “County of Kings.”
