Jackson Free Press

Society perceives the African American male in stereotypical ways—including the uneducated athlete, the drug dealer, the drug addict and the gangster.

Mark Henderson, chairman of the Speech and Theater Department at Jackson State University and artistic director of MADDRAMA, focused his play, "New Beginnings," on eight stereotypes society tends to hold about black men. The characters in his play, which is tonight at 7:30 in the McCoy Auditorium at JSU, depict each of these stereotypes in the most extreme form. At the end, those same characters come back out on stage and refute the stereotypes they represent.

"One prime example is that we often hear that there are more black men in prison than in college," Henderson said. "So, the prisoner character comes back at the end and tells the audience that if you look at black men of all ages, then there would be more in prison than in college. However, if you look at college age black men, those who are in their early 20s, there are not more of them in prison. There are more college age black men in college than in prison. We do that with every stereotype the characters portray.

"I wrote and started this show because I wanted a young person in the audience to see how ridiculous you might look if this is what you ascribe to," Henderson said.

Henderson originally established MADDRAMA because he wanted JSU to have a drama group that offered more for its members.

"There was a drama club at the time, but it was limited," Henderson said. "I wanted students to not only get on stage and perform, but to be able to write, design and choreograph. I wanted to give them the all-inclusive aspect of performance they weren't otherwise getting and to pull out every aspect of the students' performance abilities."

When Henderson established MADDRAMA in 1998, "New Beginnings" was one of the first traveling performances for the group. It has been a regular part of the lineup of shows ever since.

MADDRAMA has been on JSU's campus since 2004. The group currently has more than 150 members who perform throughout the country. Part of MADDRAMA's mission is ensuring that each performance its members put on entertains and educates at the same time.

Tonight's performance marks the close of MADDRAMA Week. The MADDRAMA group put on a different show each night this week, such as MAD Gospel Explosion, MADly Amazing Race—which focused on health issues and exercise as well as getting involved with the health complex on campus—and Domination Collaboration, which pulled together other performance groups on campus and had them collaborate, such as the jazz group playing music for the dance group to perform to and the drama group doing performances based on the writings of the poetry group.

For tonight's performance of "New Beginnings," Henderson has gathered past JSU alumni who have performed the play for MADDRAMA and is having them reprise their old roles. Among them is Prince Duren—a former graduate who is now a professor at the university and plays the part of the uneducated athlete—and Kenneth Carter, who came from Dallas to perform.

"I really want to say how exciting it is to do this," Henderson said. "I'm glad that this play is still relevant today after all these years, and I'll make sure we will keep showing it to new generations. It's a play that, if you leave in the middle, you won't get the message. You have to see the whole thing to get the message on how important it is to rid our society of those images."

"New Beginnings" is tonight at 7:30 pm in the McCoy Auditorium. Admission is $5 for any student with ID and for senior adults, and $10 for general admission. For information call JSU's box office at 601-979-5956 or visit maddrama.com.