American Rot
Written by Kate Taney Billingsley
Directed by Estelle Parsons
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March 14 – 31, 2024
Thursdays – Saturdays at 7PM
Sundays at 2PM
Ellen Stewart Theatre
66 East 4th Street, 2nd floor
New York, NY 10003
Tickets:
Adults: $30
Students/Seniors: $25
First 10 tickets are $10 (limit 2 per person)
Ticket prices are inclusive of all fees.
OPEN CAPTIONING will be available for the performance on Friday, March 22 at 7PM.
Set in a diner off the New Jersey turnpike, two historically-linked American families explore the roots of their trans-generational trauma through difficult conversations on racism and white supremacy. Stricken with guilt, Jim Taney, a descendant of Chief Justice Roger Brooke Taney, who penned the infamous Dred Scott decision of 1857, offers an apology to the family of Walter Scott, a descendant of the formerly enslaved Dred Scott. Walter, and a Chorus of other characters, investigate why an apology alone will not absolve Jim. As protest theater, the play confronts the concept of white “wokeness”, the boundaries of white liberalism, and unveils the shared national consequences of white supremacy; serving as an entryway into a dialogue on reparations.
TALKBACKS
Friday, March 15: Lynne Jackson, great-great-granddaughter of Dred Scott; Charlie Taney, great-great-great-nephew of Roger B. Taney, Kate Taney Billingsley, and Estelle Parsons
Thursday, March 21: Estelle Parsons, Kate Taney Billingsley, Rick D’Avino and more
Saturday, March 23: Michelle Greer, descendant of the Hill family
Writer: Kate Taney Billingsley
Music: Kate Taney Billingsley, Tyler Bernhardt, and Dag Markhus
Director: Estelle Parsons
Executive Producers: Richard D’Avino and Pamela Murphy
Associate Producer: Myla Pitt
Choreographer: William Whitener
Set Designer: Christine Weppner
Lighting Designer: Victor En Yu Tan
Captioning is being provided, in part, by a grant from NYSCA/TDF TAP Plus.
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