Named one of TIME magazine’s “100 Innovators for the Next New Wave,” Suzan-Lori Parks is the first African American woman to receive the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Topdog/Underdog. She joins to discuss her long and illustrious career as a playwright, musician, and novelist.
Debbie Millman:
It’s likely we all know something about the foundational American story of Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson. She was his property and she bore six of his children. When Jefferson died after a 30-year relationship, he didn’t free her in his will, as was often common at the time. Suzan-Lori Parks has staged some of the most important works of contemporary American theater, and as a result, she has won nearly every artistic accolade, including a Pulitzer Prize, several Tony Awards and a MacArthur Genius Grant. Her latest play is a play within a play titled Sally and Tom. In it, she presents the story of Sally Hemings and Thomas Jefferson and explores the complications and contradictions of their relationship with candor, pathos and a group of phenomenal actors. Sally and Tom is currently on stage at the Public theater in New York City. Suzan-Lori is also a novelist and a member of the band Sula and the Joyful Noise. Suzan-Lori Parks, welcome to Design Matters.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Thanks for having me here, Debbie. This is fun.
Debbie Millman:
Thank you. Suzan-Lori, I know that in addition to all you do artistically, I understand you’re also an advanced brown belt in karate.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, that’s so kind of you to mention, Debbie. Yes. I would say I was an advanced brown belt in karate. It’s the traditional Seido Karate, traditional Japanese karate, and that was a long time ago. 1996 is when I was among with all the other students invited to take our black belt test. And I woke up the next day and said, “I need to be doing yoga.” And so I happily left the dojo, a lot of good friends there, and started my yoga practice that I’ve had since then. So I don’t know if I’m actually a brown belt, advanced brown belt anymore. I think I’m just a leather belt or a tweed belt. That’s what [inaudible 00:02:13] belt. There you go.
Debbie Millman:
You were born in Fort Knox, Kentucky down the road from Abraham Lincoln’s birthplace.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yes.
Debbie Millman:
Your father was a colonel in the United States Army. And you spent your early childhood in Odessa, Texas while your dad served a tour in Korea and two in Vietnam. How did your family manage while he was away so much?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Well, yeah, it’s what families do when one of the parents or sometimes both of the parents have to go away and difficult things. I think Army families or families with one or more parents of the service have organizational principles that other families might not understand. My dad served a tour in Korea and then two tours in Vietnam. I wasn’t born when he was in Korea, obviously, but when he went to Vietnam, it was the summer of ’68, and we were living in California at the time at Fort Ord.
He got the assignment, he had to go to Vietnam, and my parents decided that the smartest thing to do would be to go to West Texas where my mom is from and live there because a black woman with three small children living alone was not the safest thing to do in 1968. And so we got in a car and we drove as we often did to the next place we were going to live. And so we drove down to Odessa, Texas and rented a house down the street from my mom’s mom and dad and family, and had a amazing time. Loved being in Texas while dad was away in war. And it was very intense. And I know my mom now speaks of how worried she was all the time, but she didn’t share that with us, little, small, little children.
Debbie Millman:
Your dad was also an avid fan of opera, and when he came home, I understand he would walk around the house lip-syncing to Puccini and Wagner. Did that instill in you an early appreciation of opera?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
It instilled in me an early appreciation of the bazaar. My dad was 6’4, a darker shade of soul, handsome, charismatic, very deep thinker. One of his favorite books was The Inner Game of Tennis. If anybody’s read that, it’s a brilliant book about how to utilize the capacities of your mind. But yeah, and for fun, yeah, he would play tennis and he would turn on the reel to reel. Back in the day, that’s what a lot of music was on, turn on the reel to reel and have his Wagner or Puccini blaring throughout the house. And he would walk around lip-syncing and it was absolutely fantastic. It was very bazaar and beautiful. I mean, I tell people that my dad wanted to live large in a world that didn’t want him to live at all. And that was very moving to me to watch a guy who grew up very, very impoverished, only joined the army because he wanted to go to college.
There was no money for him to go to college. And the ROTC was the only way he could go to college. And then of course, the conflict in Korea and all those conflicts that turned into wars happened and he was kind of swept up in that. But it was very moving and very beautiful. My mom was a big fan of jazz, still is a big fan of jazz. All the greats, Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughn and Dave Brubeck. And she would always be trying to teach us how to jitterbug dance. I don’t think I ever learned, actually. She still tries to teach me when I go to visit.
Debbie Millman:
You also began writing poems and songs that even created a newspaper with your brother titled The Daily Daily. What made you decide to do that and do you still have any of those issues?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
You know everything about me. Wow, my gosh, you know everything about me. It was a weird, what made me decide to do that. I’m always a… I just still today. And you see it in 365 Days\/365 Plays or Plays for the Plague Year, certainly where I just look out the window and go, “What’s going on?” And that’s what I did as a fourth grader. And we lived in Burlington Vermont. My dad, returning from Vietnam took two years away from the Army as was allowed. He got his master’s degree and we lived in Vermont. And I would sit up in our attic and look out the window. There’d be things going on. And I thought, “Let me write a newspaper called The Daily Daily.”
Debbie Millman:
And did you distribute it to your friends or your family or-
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, sure, sure. I mean, we didn’t have the photocopying capabilities of distributing things back then, but sure there was a… I typed it up on a little manual typewriter and passed it out. It’s weird to hand out copies of the news to people who be like, “Well, you’re talking about me there. When I chased my cat across the street, when I tried ice skating or when I kissed Scott Young at the tennis court
,” whatever. And I would watch all these things. I was also enamored of the book Harriet the Spy and Harriet, she did that. She walked around. I’m looking for it on my bookshelf. Where is it? There it is. Louise Fitzhugh. Louise Fitzhugh is the writer. And Harriet the spy would walk around her neighborhood with a notebook and she’d write down things. And I thought, “That’s kind of cool.” But also, I loved writing songs. I would make up songs to go along with whatever was on the radio, it was a hobby, a little fun thing I would do.
Debbie Millman:
In 1974, you and your family moved to Germany where your father was stationed, and you lived in Frankfurt, Gelnhausen, Oberwesel and in Höchst, which was a very, very old small town. And you attended local schools there from sixth to ninth grade. And you’ve said that when you were living in Germany, you and your family were often the only Black people that some people had ever seen live and that people would just stare at you. How did you manage through that experience?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah, we lived in Gelnhausen. We lived in Frankfurt, we lived in Oberwesel, we lived in Höchst. My parents sent us to German schools because they thought that that would be a wonderful experience and it was, we learned German. I was fluent in German after about three months, you just inhale the language. That was my experience anyway. And yeah, the only Black person in the room or the only Black person anybody ever seen, it had also happened in Vermont. I remember going to the state fair, the Champlain Valley Fair, it was called. And we walked into the fair, the fairgrounds.
It was very lovely. And it was a group of people who went [inaudible 00:09:46]. And there I was with my mom, and my mom is a lighter skin complexion than I am. It’s hard if you’re just listening to this, but in the community, we call it light skinded. And so ma is light skinded and so they weren’t exclaiming about mom, they were exclaiming about me, and they proceeded to come up to me and pet me. And I stood very still. Yeah, I stood very still. And what do you say? Similar things happened in Germany and more recently, quite honestly, I was in Cambodia at the Temple of Angkor Wat as a tourist with a guide, all by myself that I’d gone there and there I was looking at a beautiful statue. It was gorgeous. Angkor Wat is so amazing.
Debbie Millman:
Yes. It’s magical.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Standing there, right, it was magical, totally. And I’m standing there and looking, and then I hear behind me, “Oh,” same kind of, “Oh,” that kind of thing. And I was kind of alarmed and I turned around to see what the commotion was. There were a group of people, they later told me through their tour guide that their group of people from China, they were all pointing vigorously in my direction. Of course, I thought they were pointing at the statue. And I moved aside so they could get a better look because they had their cameras out and they rushed toward me. And I kept moving aside, realizing all the while that they were running toward me. And they mobbed me. And I stood very still. I’d been through this before. You see? You stand very still. And they pet me and they took pictures with me. I put a modest smile on my face and flashed a peace sign. And then they went on to look at something else.
Debbie Millman:
How did you keep your composure?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I embraced the difficult things. I work to see the humanity in all of us because it’s there. What am I going to do? Get mad at some… I mean, I don’t know, they’d never seen one of me before. Conversely, I went to Cuba with a wonderful group. I think the MacArthur-
Debbie Millman:
Fellows.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
MacArthur Fellows.
PART 1 OF 4 ENDS [00:12:04]
Suzan-Lori Parks:
MacArthur Fellows. That’s it. Thank you. MacArthur Fellows. And I walk down the street of Cuba in Havana, and everybody, men, women, and children are saying, “Linde, linde.” And I’m like, “Yeah, this is where I’m from.” So it’s all good. You just got to keep going.
Debbie Millman:
You came back to the United States just in time for you to finish high school. And despite your love of writing, you had a high school teacher that actually told you that you would never be a writer.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah, they didn’t tell me I would never be a writer. They told me that with my skillset, it might not turn out the way I had hoped. Just to be clear, when I was a student in high school, there was a, I guess you could say rubric by which one’s intelligence or suitability for certain professions was determined. If you wanted to be a writer, spelling was one of those yardsticks, if you will. Maybe that’s the right word. I was never a good speller. So I would draw a circle around that. If you can draw a circle around the word spell and then speller and draw a circle around the word speller in your mind. Okay, so remember that. So the teacher, she’d give us … what do you call it? Spelling tests every Friday. Give you the list of words on Monday, give you the test on Friday.
I would study really hard because I loved school and I was a good student generally. Every Friday I failed the test because I liked to make things up, see? So I was like, “Oh, that could go like this. That’s spelling of that word. Oh, it could be like that.” That would always … So I failed the spelling test. And so in looking at my grades at the end of the year, and I said I wanted to be a writer, she suggested, I think with a certain amount of care, “You might be better suited to science.” Where my grades were very, very high. It would ace my physics tests, for example. And I said, “Yeah, that’s cool spelling.” So now all these years later, there are architectural shapes in my place called spells, and I am a very great speller, actually. I just had to find my own way to do it.
So it was cool. Again, it’s like … And the funniest thing, I was doing a lecture … nah, I don’t know where, somewhere, Illinois maybe about 15, 20 years ago … no, maybe 10 years ago. And a former classmate from that school came up to me, and his name was Steve. And he said, “Oh my God, SLP, you mean she told you that you shouldn’t be a writer because you’re such a lousy speller?” And I said, “Yeah, bro, that’s how it went down.” And he said, “She told me the same thing.” And I said, “Well, what did you become?” Well, he’s a medical doctor, so he’s doing all right too.
Debbie Millman:
You also started playing guitar in high school as well and fell in love with it. Did you have thoughts at that point of potentially becoming a musician?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah, I had started playing piano as a kid and violin as a kid in Vermont after dad came back from Vietnam. They had a little money saved, mom and dad, and they spent all of it on a baby grand piano. That’s how much they love music. They wanted music in the home. And we took piano lessons and I enjoyed piano lessons, we all did. And I also gravitated to the guitar. I was just telling a friend today that there was a show on PBS or something. I think it was Pete Seeger had a show, maybe it was called Hootenanny or something. Maybe I’m just making that up. But Pete Seeger had a show and he would invite artists, musicians onto his show. And I believe he had Libba Cotton on his show, Reverend Gary Davis on his show, and he himself, of course, played the banjo brilliantly.
And I would watch that show and think, “Oh wow, now there’s something to do.” And again, I was always making little songs to go along with whatever was on the radio. But yeah, it was in high school … Before high school, I actually think I started playing the guitar. And then … Yeah, it was at a time before MTV and all the internet and all that where if you didn’t see something yourself, it was hard to believe it was actually happening. You had all these people around the world who’d never seen a living, breathing, Black person before, and you had all these people around the world who’d never seen many Black people playing the guitar or the banjo. And so the assumption was that Black people didn’t play the guitar, which I was told by my Black and white friends alike.
Debbie Millman:
You were told that you couldn’t do an awful lot of things as you were growing up.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I know. I know. The road is littered with things that I’ve been told not to do, or, “You know what? How about take this path?” And I really do take the note. I was a science major in college to start with, and then I drifted over into the English department because I blame it on Virginia Woolf.
Debbie Millman:
Yeah, I read that To the Lighthouse really changed your life.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah, To the Lighthouse.
Debbie Millman:
I love book, it’s one of my all-time favorites. Oh, my God.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Isn’t it great?
Debbie Millman:
That first page is one of the most beautiful openings of any book, I think.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, say something … I don’t remember the first phrase. Tell me something.
Debbie Millman:
Oh, I don’t remember. “Mrs. Ramsey said it was going to be fine. It was going be fine.” And I just love that. “It’s going to be fine.”
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah. I love how she dies and Virginia will puts that in parentheses. I think that’s brilliant. Just brilliant. Yeah, that’s it. “Will it be fine? Will it be fine? And I’m knitting socks for the lighthouse keeper’s son.” And finally the woman, the painter, whose name is-
Debbie Millman:
That, I don’t remember that. That, I don’t remember.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I can’t remember. Oh, I can’t remember. We’ll remember it by the end. Nobody look it up. I love not knowing things and then just having the uncertainty hang in the air’s. It’s a game.
Debbie Millman:
Oh, I hate that.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, I love it. I’m just like, “You know what? It’s negative capability like Keith’s talked about.” We don’t know. It is knowable, but we don’t know, and we’re just going to not know for … Lily Briscoe. There you go.
Debbie Millman:
There you go. Thank you.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
It returns. And I think she’s painting and she finally finishes her painting. To the Lighthouse. Yeah, To the Lighthouse was my lighthouse. How about that?
Debbie Millman:
Beautiful.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Thank you, Virginia Woolf. Yeah.
Debbie Millman:
You started writing again and took a class, you applied to take a creative workshop taught by James Baldwin at Hampshire College. You got in and got to work with James Baldwin alongside 15 other students every Monday afternoon. And I believe you were first introduced to James Baldwin when your parents gifted you his book, The Fire Next Time for Valentine’s Day when you were in the fourth grade. That’s a really interesting gift from a parent.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah. My parents were people … Again, my dad was in the Army. My mom was a college professor. They’d met in college. One could say they were very sort of traditional, dad being in the Army. They were also quietly radical. To send us to German school. No American parents, white, Black or other were doing that, zero. And then to give me … When I said, “I’m interested in writing.” I was sitting under the piano writing my novel and they were like, “Okay, well if you’re interested in writing, here’s a book.” I read a little bit of it. Honestly, I think I studied the back cover of the book more than anything, because I just would look at his face and be like, “Wow, here’s a writer.” And then, yeah, 10 years, 11 years later, something like that, there I was, and he was at the head of this library table at Hampshire College teaching us creative writing. 10 years, that’s all it took.
Debbie Millman:
You started writing again, and I read this really beautiful paragraph about your experience writing The Wedding Pig, and you said, “I was typing as if people were standing near me talking and I kept thinking, ‘If I turn around, they’ll leave.’ And I just copied down what they were saying. It’s been that way ever since.” And I’m wondering, since you wrote that and said that, is it still that way for you?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
That’s lovely. I’ve forgotten. Yeah, that’s exactly what it was. I was in my dorm room, it was around four o’clock in the afternoon and the sun was setting, so it was, I guess in the fall, beautiful. Mount Holyoke College is such a beautiful place, and it’s just great academics too. I really enjoyed my time there. And so the sun was setting and I was writing, and I don’t know if you’ve had this experience, Debbie, where you’re writing and it feels like you are digging the ditch, put the spade in the earth and flip it over your shoulder.
Debbie Millman:
I call that torture.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh. Well see, and there you go. I just call it digging. You see, I think … I realized through just these few minutes talking with you, I have a high tolerance for what most people might call difficult. So anyway, so there I am digging. I would call it doing the work. And then it’s as if I’m not digging at all. It’s just being dug. That is a great feeling. That never happened to me before, because again, I started as a writer by looking out the window and going, “Oh, what’s happening? Oh, someone’s chasing her cat or kissing a boy by the tennis courts.”
That was my way of writing, reporting basically really in an interesting kind of weird … or voyeurism in a weird kind of way. And now I was being visited. Yeah, it did feel like if I turned around, they would leave. And it has felt like that before, but I think it’s stronger now. I can actually tune in. When we’re in rehearsal and I need a new line, everything can be swirling around. Or when I need a new verse for a song. And the other day, the guys, we were rehearsing and I wrote a song, which is two chords, and they’re making fun.
All the songs we perform in the band Sula and the Joyful Noise, I’ve written. And I just love them, and the band is very supportive and the band loves them too. But they were joking with me about this one. Because they liked to do things on the changes, and there weren’t enough chord changes. And so I just went home and just wrote a bridge, three more verses, whatever, I came in like, “Here.” So yeah, sometimes it feels easier to tune in to the channel, if you will. And I can move my head around with the confidence that-
PART 2 OF 4 ENDS [00:24:04]
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I can move my head around with the confidence that they won’t leave me.
Debbie Millman:
That’s beautiful. I call that the zone. It sometimes happens when I’m doing research and-
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, cool.
Debbie Millman:
…hours will go by. That’s one of my favorite parts of doing this show is sort of embodying my guest for the time that I’m working to prepare, and it’s been really fun with you.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, cool.
Debbie Millman:
Your first produced play was the one-act show Betting on the Dust Commander, and it debuted at The Gas Station, which was a bar on Manhattan’s Lower East Side in 1987, and the show ran for three nights. You used an extension cord for the lights up, lights down cues, and plugged and unplugged the extension cord yourself. Do you still have that extension cord?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I not only have the physical extension cord, I have the psychic extension cord because Debbie last night, Sula And The Joyful Noise played a fantastic gig at the Francis Kite Club, which is kind of a kitty corner across the street from where The Gas Station used to be. It’s in spitting distance.
Debbie Millman:
Wow.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
And I was hanging out there with one of the owners, Kyp Malone, who’s a great musician from TV On The Radio and the booker, John Weiss. I said, “My first play in New York was like a spitting distance from here at The Gas Station. He lives across the street from where that was.” We had this memory lane, and then he said, “If you want more lights on the stage,” where we were performing last night, he brought out a clip light.
And I was like, “Dude, this is so amazing.” So I’m still very connected to that experience. It was cool last night to be there and sort of starting my public musician life for real, and having it that be one of the first places that we perform as a band.
Debbie Millman:
You met George C. Wolfe after he came to see or play The Death of the Last Black Man in the Whole Entire World, A.K.A. The Negro Book of the Dead. And he told you at the time he was going to run a theater and he was going to do your plays. Did you believe him?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, well, I believe the first part that he was going to run a theater, oh, sure. Because George C. Wolfe is a genius, talented, kind, righteous brother, force of nature kind of person. So when he says something, “I’m going to run a theater,” I said, “Yeah, you sure are.”
“And I’m going to do your plays.” The second part, I was like, “Well, I don’t really… maybe.” Everybody was telling me that they were going to do my plays.
Debbie Millman:
Well, yeah, that was after you won the Obie.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah, for Best New American Play in 1990. So after that happened, in my experience, everybody was saying, “We’re going to do your play.” So I didn’t really think too much of that part, but it sure was exciting when he became artistic director of the Public Theater and actually started doing my plays, The America Play specifically in 1994, 30 years ago. I sound like those people when they saw me, 30 years ago in the Martinson Theater where Sally & Tom is now playing. It’s a bunch of circles, people, it’s just a bunch of circles. Good circles, good spirals, yeah.
Debbie Millman:
He also produced and directed your play Topdog/Underdog at the Ambassador Theater. Is it true that you wrote that play in three days?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
It is true [inaudible 00:27:46]-
Debbie Millman:
Do you usually write that quickly?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
No, not at all. What I did for that one… No, Sally & Tom took 10 years. Part of the, in my experience, the life of, in the arts, is to not trip on things that might trip you up. So, oh, you’re right, Topdog/Underdog in three days, and so many people think it’s, “Oh, it’s amazing, oh…” They’d sound again. Right?
Or Sally & Tom, it took me 10 years. People think it’s amazing.
What I love about both experiences is I love the work. I love the digging and the being dug and how you trade… Sometimes I’m holding the spade, sometimes the spirit is holding the spade. We’re getting the work done. It’s good.
Debbie Millman:
Topdog/Underdog went on to win the Pulitzer Prize in drama, which made you the first ever African American playwright to win the award. The New York Times theater critics have since declared Topdog/Underdog, the best American play of the previous quarter-century, and the best since Tony Kushner’s Angels in America in 1993. And a revival of the show won both the 2023 Tony Award and the Outer Critics Circle Award.
In 2001, you received the MacArthur Genius Award. Suzan-Lori, has winning so many awards impacted the way you write or the way you think about your writing, or the expectations of your writing.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
These are such good questions. The expectation from whom? From me?
Debbie Millman:
Yourself, yeah.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh no… Well, you said you were embodying me, so I would think you’d probably be better at answering the question than I would be. What do you think? What would you answer when you were embodying me? Say-
Debbie Millman:
If I were embodying you, I’d be like, “No.”
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Right.
Debbie Millman:
If I were speaking as me, I would say everything impacts the feelings that I have about what I do, which is both a good thing and a terrible thing.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
And both are true right?
Debbie Millman:
Yeah.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Light is a particle and a wave. So both are true. And yet my relationship to the awards are right-sized. I win awards that I have done the work for, and it feels right. Topdog won the Pulitzer, it felt right. Damn good play. It wasn’t a shoddy piece of work, and it lasts through my lifetime. The praise for Sally & Tom, it’s a good one. I can feel when it’s good. I’ve worked on it very diligently and joyfully, joyfully. So much love I’ve put in that play. So many good jokes.
Debbie Millman:
I was actually going to ask you about the humor, but congratulations on what I think might be the best New York Times review of a play
of all time that came out a few days ago.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I haven’t read it. See, I haven’t read it. I haven’t read it.
Debbie Millman:
Oh my God.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
When the producers jump up and down, then I know it’s good. And they say, “It’s good.”
Debbie Millman:
Oh my God.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, okay. Oh shoot. Okay, someday I’m going to read it.
Debbie Millman:
Yeah, I have to tell you, it’s actually… It’s like orgasmic.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh wow. Okay, okay.
Debbie Millman:
It really is, I think the best review I’ve ever read of anything; it’s that good. But in 2023… Well, first of all, why did it take, or how did it take 10 years to write Sally & Tom?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Well, there’s just a lot going on, there was a lot going on for me. I was being a mom, and that takes extra wavelengths.
But I just want to go back to I haven’t read the review. Yes, things do impact what I write, but not in that kind of like, “Oh, if people say I’m good, so I’m going to be worried.” It’s not that. It’s more like I’m very mindful of anything I let in my head or life as much as I can be, and having a kid whose life is, “Oh, TikTok,” or what have you, I’m just being very mindful about what I let into my head or life as much as I can be.
So yeah, but there’s a lot going on. So because it’s a play about people making a play, there are at least 16 characters in the play.
Debbie Millman:
And they play different parts.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yes. I’m sorry, Debbie. So there are eight actors, I would say, who play more than one role, and that’s by design. And I hope in the future, that’s how the play will be done.
Because some of my plays would double casting, people think, “Oh, it doesn’t really… We’ll just do it…”
But it’s very, very, very, very, very deliberate and joyful because the character in 1790 gets to experience what the character in 2024 gets to experience, and vice versa. So there’s a lot going on in that play. There’s a lot of, I say freight to move. There is a lot history to process, you could say download, there’s a lot of buffering going on. You have to really process a lot of stuff to get to the song of the play, the beautiful song. I felt like Thomas Jefferson had invited me into his house and I listened to him and I listened to Sally and then, “Oh, there was James also had something to say.”
Debbie Millman:
Sally’s brother.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Sally’s brother James. And they all were singing, and of course other people in the household were singing. And then you realize, but it’s not just history, it’s us. And we are singing too. And all these stories are beautiful and painful and worth embracing and worth considering.
James Baldwin has this wonderful quote, darn, let’s see if I can remember it, “History is trapped in people…” No, “People are trapped in history and history is trapped in us.” Sorry to butcher it, but something like that. So the idea that we are trapped in history and history is trapped in us, and this double play, this playmaking, this play, let’s play with this. Let’s, in a loving way, and see what they say when they know that I love them.
Debbie Millman:
That’s very generous.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I stood still while they pet me on the head, because I am doing the Work, capital W, for the highest cause, make no mistake.
I say that writing is my love language, and guess how much I love you when you find yourself in one of my plays? Whether I intended to write you in Plays for the Plague Year, or you just connect with something that’s me saying, “I love you, I love you. I don’t even know you.”
And I feel like that is my work as an artist to communicate that to people. There’s a lot of loving in Sally & Tom.
And it took a lot of getting out of the way. That’s probably what it was, right? There are eight characters or actually 16 characters in multiple time zones all singing this song, love letter to America, love letter to theater, and yeah, there’s a lot of anger that you have to process. There’s a lot of shame, there’s a lot of doubt. There’s a lot of desire to go, “Rawr.” There’s a lot of that, you have to just-
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Suzan-Lori Parks:
… desire to go, “Rawr.” There’s a lot of that, you’ve got to just process that, you have to channel that, you have to clean it up or figure it out or sort it. Buffering. When your computer says, “Buffering,” or when the little colored wheel goes around, that’s your computer saying, “I’m working on it.” There’s a lot of that, and I think now, as it is now, that Sally and Tom is a diagnostic. Like if you go to your doctor and you get an annual checkup, they run the tests, or you take your car into the servicing center, they run the diagnostic and they see where…
So, in my experience, I’ve had friends go to see the play, when they say something like, “But I don’t understand why such-and-such, why [inaudible 00:36:50] goes back and says hello to his friends after he leaves,” Something like… I say, “Wow, that’s where you’re holding. That’s where you’re clinching.”
“Why this happens in act one.”
That’s why you’re clinching. I know that because I experienced it as well. In the very end of the play, the gesture that happens between Sally and Tom, it wasn’t scripted until I saw it for the first time in front of an audience and knew that the gesture had to change, and I had been clinching, I had been clinching, and instead of clinching my fists in earned and righteous anger, I opened my hand, and that’s Sally’s gesture in the play. And I have a spiritual understanding that forgiveness is necessary for freedom to happen. No one said it would be easy, but that’s part of the work. So when Sally opens her hand toward the end of the play, it wasn’t happening in the first couple of performances, definitely, because I didn’t want it to happen.
Debbie Millman:
Yeah, I think that being in the audience, I struggled with whether or not she should feel love, optimism, forgiveness for Thomas Jefferson. There’s so many contradictions and conflicts that you’re trying to process at the same time, in addition to there being so much humor that you want to laugh, but then you’re not sure if you should laugh. I know that that’s intentional, but there were times when I wanted to say to the person sitting next to me, “This isn’t funny,” but it was, but it was for a different reason.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Exactly.
Debbie Millman:
Yeah.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Right, right, yeah. We bring different experiences to the theater, which makes it such a necessary art form. There are so many things about theater that make it absolutely necessary to the continued positive, progressive motion of our culture. And just to be very clear, Sally and Tom does not make light of slavery-
Debbie Millman: No.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
… we are not laughing at enslaved people. We are also not laughing or making a buffoon out of Thomas Jefferson. Light is a particle and a wave. Sally says to Thomas Jefferson, “Liar, coward. I hate you.” She also says, “Did I love him? Did I hate him? It was both.”
Debbie Millman:
Right.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
And we have to learn or continue to exercise the muscle of entertaining a multitude of possibilities. That’s our human superpower. Not even human, that’s our universal superpower. I think it extends to beautiful creatures, like puppy dogs and tables and chairs, where you can just expand your mind, like Scout says, “Expand your mind.” So it’s seeing the entirety and the beauty of the entirety. You see both sides, you see all sides. It’s not just a play about race relations, a lot of people… And I think that’s why people are moved by it, because there’s a Korean American character in the play who speaks of her experience, there are two guys who fall in love in the play, and so it’s not just about heteronormative love. It’s us, it’s all of us, it works to be all of us as much as it can be.
Debbie Millman:
Suzan-Lori, there’s a bit of dialogue, or actually, a monologue, at the end of act one, the character of Thomas Jefferson speaks to the audience, and I’m wondering if it’d be okay to read some of that, if I could read some of that?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I don’t know, what is it that you’re going to read?
Debbie Millman:
“I’m Thomas Jefferson, and I owned people, I owned them. Contemplate for a moment, if you will, the depth of what that means.” He tells us that, at Monticello, there were more than 600 enslaved people, and that, on his deathbed, he didn’t free them. He tells us about Sally. “I was in my 40s when I met her. She was just 14. Hate on me, go ahead. I’m Thomas Jefferson. My face is on Mount Rushmore. I am the man. Love me, hate me, go ahead. I stand at the intersection of the horrible and the splendid and the dizzy-making contradiction that is all of us.”
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah, that’s Thomas Jefferson. He’s standing there telling us some of the things that he did that we might have issue with, he’s very upfront about it, and he knows that some people will still honor him and no minds will change, and that’s okay. But I think it is important for him as a character, because all the characters in the play are on a continuum of freedom, they’re all moving toward freedom, and to get to freedom, you have to pass through forgiveness. And what Mike says in act two, “Forgive me, forgive me,” he’s speaking for himself and for his character.
Debbie Millman:
Yeah.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
The content of his character, who is Thomas Jefferson?
Debbie Millman:
Yeah. Mike disappoints me in the show. I was surprised at how much he disappointed me. I wanted him to be a better person.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah.
Debbie Millman:
I wanted him so badly.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Absolutely, yes.
Debbie Millman:
Yeah.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yes, yes, yes. And in that, I think you give him the chance that he needs.
Debbie Millman:
One of the centerpiece conflicts in the show is whether or not to cut a monologue performed by James Hemings, which was Sally’s brother, and the company’s financier wants Luce, the playwright, and the actress also plays Sally, to eliminate it because he thinks it’s too woke. He also wants Sally and Tom to have a more optimistic ending. Do you think that that ever could be possible?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh, you mean the ending that they have in the beginning of the play of Sally and Tom, they discard?
Debbie Millman: Yeah.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
So I think optimism is necessary, but optimism… They say, Mike and Luce say in their first scene together, when Luce says, “This is not a love story,” and Mike says, “It’s more like a truth and reconciliation story,” she says, “Exactly.” And I think truth and reconciliation, the possibility of forgiveness, and the possibility to look at your history and wrestle with it as a way to go forward, is a superpower, and I think we can use more of it these days.
Debbie Millman:
Given the sold out run at the Public Theater, given the remarkable reviews, do you and the producers have plans to bring it to Broadway?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Oh. Since opening, I’ve been focused on my band. I haven’t had conversations about taking it to Broadway, not that the conversations are not happening. It took 10 years to write, I poured so much love and intellectual muscles, I put so much love into that play. I’m so pleased that the transmission is happening, which is really an artist’s delight, I’m very grateful.
Debbie Millman:
I want to talk to you about your band, Sula and the Joyful Noise. I believe your husband is also in the band.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
He is.
Debbie Millman:
You’ve been playing. Tell us a little bit more about how you started the band and-
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Sure, sure.
Debbie Millman:
… more about the kind of music you play.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Yeah. You could call it neo-soul, rock and soul music.
Debbie Millman:
And you write all the music?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I write all the words and music, I write all the songs. We have drums and bass and a vibraphone player, vibes and synth he plays, and then trumpet, and then horns and lead guitar. It’s a great group of musicians. We’ll release the music as I feel like it’s time, I’m not in a hurry. I just like playing it live. There’s some great tunes, and I’m very proud of them.
Debbie Millman:
My last question, when is your next novel going to be coming out?
Suzan-Lori Parks:
I know. Soon, soon, soon. Yeah, Random House, yeah. It’s in the works, I’m working on it.
Debbie Millman:
Wonderful.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Thank you so much, Debbie.
Debbie Millman:
Suzan-Lori Parks, thank you for making so much work that matters, and thank you for joining me today on Design Matters.
Suzan-Lori Parks:
Thank you, Debbie.
Debbie Millman:
Suzan-Lori Parks’ play, Sally and Tom, is currently playing at the Public Theater in New York City. You can read lots more about Suzan-Lori Parks and Sula and the Joyful Noise at suzanloriparks.com, and that’s Suzan with a Z, not an S, sort of like Liza. This is the 19th year we’ve been podcasting Design Matters, and I’d like to thank you for listening. And remember, we can talk about making a difference, we can make a difference, or we can do both. I’m Debbie Millman, and I look forward to talking with you again soon.