Media > Palmer Park is Based on Real Events in Late 1960s
“What we’ve got here…I’d call a modern day urban Eden”
Inspired by actual events in Detroit in 1967, Palmer Park is about a neighborhood of highly educated professionals where all are committed to creating a truly integrated community. Everyone is kind. Everyone is smart. Everyone is friends. What could go wrong?
The play is set shortly after the Detroit race riots of 1967, a time of "white flight" from the troubled city. In the aftermath of the riots, the palatial homes in the Detroit residential area of Palmer Park sold for rock bottom prices. The play opens with a young white couple, professor Martin Townsend and his wife Kate, moving to Detroit and buying a house alongside a young black professional couple, Fletcher and Linda Hazelton.
While realtors of the era believed that “Integration is what occurs between the first black moving in and the last white moving out," the couples (and their neighbors) set out to prove everyone wrong and create a truly integrated community. Briefly, they succeed. Their haven is soon challenged when those outside the neighborhood reveal the fragility of race relations of the time.
After directing Clockwise’s first production Kita y Fernanda, Doug McDade (also current Shattered Globe Managing Director) returns to helm Palmer Park by playwright Joanna McClelland Glass. Featuring Louis Arata (Chicago), Vanita Blackman (Waukegan), Delicia Dunham (Chicago), David Guy (Chicago), Plamen Penchaff (Lindenhurst), Teri Schnaubelt (Waukegan), Cynthia Shur Petts (Chicago), Megan Skord (Chicago), James Sladek (Lake Villa), and Tharius Sumter (Chicago), a set design creating two homes, as well as photographic projections, Palmer Park is Clockwise Theatre’s most ambitious production to date.
Performances
Palmer Park runs March 16 through April 8, 2012, Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. and Sundays at 3:00 p.m. at Clockwise Theatre, 221 N. Genesee Street in Waukegan. Tickets can be purchased 24/7 from Brown Paper Tickets at 800-838-3006. Or, use the ticket link at right. Tickets are only $16.50, or $12 each for groups of ten or more.
Photos
Use the links below to download either high-resolution (for print) or low resolution (for online use) photos. Right-click the link and use your browser's "Save As" function to download the photo. Refer to the Photo Key at the end of this page for details about each photo. Photo credit: TreSe Productions of Waukegan.
Cast and Contributors
Cast
- Louis Arata (Chicago)
- Vanita Blackman (Waukegan)
- Delicia Dunham (Chicago)
- David Guy (Chicago)
- Plamen Penchaff (Lindenhurst)
- Teri Schnaubelt (Waukegan)
- Cynthia Shur Petts (Chicago)
- Megan Skord (Chicago)
- James Sladek (Lake Villa)
- Tharius Sumter (Chicago)
Contributors
- Joyce Becker Lee (Mundelein), Assistant Director
- Dave Clark (Gurnee), Set Design
- Jake Bray (Winnetka), Lighting Design
- Eric Vigo (Waukesha WI), Assistant Lighting Design
- Sharon Schmidt (Barrington), Costume Design
- Harry Porterfield (Chicago), Sound Design
- Cassandra Ellwing (Waukegan), Stage Manager
- Tess Lanni (Gurnee), Props Design, Assistant Stage Manager
- Sandra Carobine (Waukegan), Assistant Builder
- Diane Hitzeman (Gurnee), Marketing Director
About Joanna McClelland Glass
Playwright Joanna McClelland Glass was born in October 1936 in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, and has received a Rockefeller grant, a grant from the National Endowment for the Arts and a Guggenheim Fellowship. Her works have been produced across North America, in England, Australia, Ireland and Germany. She has been an American citizen since 1962 and lives in Chicago, Illinois. For complete bio, visit: http://www.canadiantheatre.com/dict.pl?term=Glass%2C%20Joanna%20McClelland.
Photo Key
Clockwise from top: Tharius Sumter as Fletcher; Cynthia Shur Petts as Kate; Louis Arata as Martin; and Delicia Dunham as Linda.
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