The show opens with the two young main characters revealing their reasons for wanting to honor the Black Panthers. One of them, whose father is spending his life in jail for being one, is distraught when his father says to him, "you're not a black panther." Similarly, the other character's black panther uncle calls him an "armchair activist."
It is the age old struggle between generations, isn't it? That all we desire is to honor those who went before us without making the same mistakes and perhaps it is sometimes cowardice that keeps us from action. this was reiterated for me when I left the theater. I had a map in front of me (the old way) but something told me (my instinct) that I was reading the map wrong. I ended up going right back to where I started from. If we don't analyze the situation correctly than we can easily get only as far as our parents generation and not further.
The older generation in the show accuses the younger generation of not doing anything, not going anywhere, being completely inactive bystanders with their cameras posed in front of them. The young man's response was what resonated the most with me. He said something to the effect of: We do want to get somewhere. That is why we deconstruct and analyze our history. We want to get it right this time.
I find myself in the same boat as the young characters; wanting to proclaim my art as activism but trembling lest i be judged of not doing more. I literally was carrying with me source material for a play I'm writing that I entitled my black lives matter piece.
I think it's in all of our blood to be revolutionaries. We were not meant to leave this world worse off than when we came into it. It burns within each one of us to make a difference. The choice is ours to rise up before it's too late and the question is how.
