Arts
For 30 years, Lou Bellamy has run the nation’s preeminent African American theater. But what a theater critic really wants to know is: How’s his golf game?
Driving Force
Bellamy isn't shooting particularly well this day, but he's a good enough sport not to mention that my atrocious game is blatantly rubbing off on him. Perhaps part of what is so appealing about this game is that it's a diversion from the deep waters he treads as an artist.
This year Bellamy received an Obie Award for his New York directorial debut of August Wilson's Two Trains Running. This year Penumbra is staging two Wilson works, The Piano Lesson and Gem of the Ocean (following the theater's traditional holiday show, Black Nativity).
"After August died, and after going to New York and what happened out there, the way people embraced the work, I thought we'd better lay this down and approach this work in a way that lasts," Bellamy says. "I'm going to direct them [Wilson's 10 plays] all. I want to lay down a line that says, here's a way to do it. It might not be the way, but it's a way that many people in the country think is okay."
After a pause, Bellamy adds, "August said that many of our shows were inspirations to him. He was an important member of our company."
It's an understatement, but beneath it is a profound truth: Penumbra, with a slate combining new work with potentially definitive stagings of Wilson's increasingly canonical dramas, might well be poised for a signature season. Adding a new wrinkle is the fact that Ocean will be staged at the Guthrie's McGuire Proscenium Stage. When it comes to partnering with the Twin Cities' theater colossus, Bellamy comes across both optimistic and pragmatic.
"You have to know who you are," he says, "and be very clear about that. An aesthetic is an ephemeral kind of thing. You want to be really clear aesthetically who you are, then I try to augment what I don't have with what someone else has. I'm really good at getting smart people around me. It doesn't scare me—I want them smarter than me. You want to mesh with someone complementary, then at the bottom it's mutual respect and fair play and so forth."
At the end of nine holes, I'm relieved. For the first time in my life I've managed to play without losing a ball, and I decide to call it quits. Bellamy shakes hands from his golf cart and decides to finish off the round. When I talk to him later, it turns out he nearly shot a hole in one.
"I shot an eight-iron on a par three," Bellamy enthuses. "It hit the green and rimmed the cup. It was really cool."
Bellamy sounds as happy as if he'd made the shot. After all, it isn't the laurels and awards that count, it's the experience. And in the matter of converting experience for the stage, few do it with as much assurance and self-possession.
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