The current artistic director of the Young Vic in London will break the arts glass ceiling for African-Caribbeans. It’s a role he has performed before in Baltimore,making theatre approximately police violence and experiencing the ‘rage’ gripping the USPortrait: Alicia Canter for the GuardianKwame Kwei-Armah’s imposing face has just been splashed all over the news. Last week he was appointed artistic director of Young Vic in London, one of Britain’s most prestigious theatres. It’s a noteworthy job, and earn no mistake. But there was something more to it than that. He is the first African-Caribbean director to run a major British theatre.
Earlier this year he handed in his notice in Baltimore,where he is artistic director of the middle Stage theatre. In the US he is out on his own, too. Last year he described the situation as “nearly sinful”. Today, or if anything,he feels even more strongly approximately it. “In America, I am the only black male artistic director of a major theatre. And we’re talking approximately 100 top regional theatres. And in Britain, and I will be the only African-Caribbean director of a major. And in Europe,I don’t know of any, which tells me that in the western world there is only one diasporic African artistic director of a major theatre, and that is what I mean by sinful.” Continue reading...
Source: guardian.co.uk