jar the floor
by carolyn ogburn

If British poet Philip Larkin had been an African American woman, he might have added to that famous line summing up twentieth century western civilization: “they fuck you up, your mum and dad…and your grandma, your great-grandmama, and on back.” Or, if he was playwright Cheryl West, he might have written Jar the Floor.

Jar the Floor is this year’s Asheville On Broadway fifth annual stage production raising money for people in Western North Carolina living with AIDS. The comedic drama raises little issues such as racism, homophobia, family, aging, cancer, incest and death. It’s political, unless you (like Lola) believe that “this isn’t politics - politics is Jesse and Martin and the late Harold Washington.” Did I mention that it’s hilarious? Pee-in-your-pants hilarious?

Set in 1990’s Chicago, four generations of African American women come together to celebrate the 90th birthday of matriarch MaDear. Her flamboyant daughter, Lola; Lola’s daughter, the academic MayDee. And “guess who’s coming to dinner?”: MayDee’s daughter Vennie, a recent college drop-out, unexpectedly brings her (white) lover Raisa to the party. Sparks, laughter – and revelations – fly.

Jar the Floor stars well-known actresses Becky Stone, Angela Jones, Janet Oliver, Stephanie Hickling and DiAnna Ritola-Schow. At a rehearsal recently, director Jerry “a gay man is as close to a black woman as you can get” Crouch, stage manager Elaine Elwood, and the 5-woman cast talked about Jar the Floor. Like family, the conversation flew fast and furious, women cutting in and over and finishing each other’s sentences, laughing and passionate.

What’s this play about?

Janet Oliver (MayDee): To me, this play is all about family. We’re going into the (holiday) season now where we’re seeing family, we’re thinking about family. You hit the door and you become 8 or 9 years old again. Whatever place we had in our families, we’re there. All the things that people say when they should stay quiet, and all the things that they should say that they don’t.

Angela Jones (Lola): There’s another dimension to the play for me: There are undertones of molestation, living without your husband, of being a single mother. Raisa has lost her breast. I think most people in the audience will be able to relate to that, “you know, that could be me, that could happen to me”

Becky Stone (MaDear): It’s a play about survival and in that sense it reaches across race, class, sex lines. We make our presence known by jarring the floor.
“Jarring the floor” refers to MaDear’s belief that the spirit of her dead husband comes in and out through the floor of the house. Metaphorically, jarring the floor – or disturbing the everyday reality.

Angela: There’s another angle to that too - she believes that he was messing around with their daughter in the shed out back, dancing with her, and she was never allowed to dance, and she is trying to now…

Janet: It’s her anthem. She’s saying: Pay attention to me, damn it. That’s what we’re all saying.

Stephanie Hickling (Vennie): That’s the jar the floor part. “Y’all listen to each other, everyone’s got all this pain and no one’s saying anything.”

Does this play bring up individual family stuff for you?

Janet: Everything I do brings up family stuff. That’s why I do it, because it’s cathartic for me. Everything I do I pull it from my past or who I am right now, I put it out there. I don’t like roles that are easy; I don’t like plays that are easy; I don’t like people that are easy. I throw all my past and my luggage and everything out there for the audience, and I feel cleared through that. I crave it. I got to get out there.

My partner and I…come from two different racial backgrounds, and I – I’ll talk about this from my experience – you say, “I’m not gonna do this like MY mother,” and you end up doing it! You end up saying the same things and doing the same things; you have things coming out of your mouth that you never thought you’d say. And your mother said it, your grandmother said it.

DiAnna Ritola-Schow (Raisa): I’ll tell you one thing: I don’t know ANY white families who talk this much! Well, maybe Italian. (laughter) (Becky: I know some Greeks who might take exception to that….) You can still love each other, and yell your head off!

Janet: It’s all about what we can’t say to each other. That even though we love each other so much, we can’t break through the stuff to get to I love you. At the end when MayDee is talking to Vennie, she says: I never said I didn’t love you, and what (Vennie is) waiting to hear is “you love me” and (MayDee) can’t do that.

What happens is your mother told you you was black and ugly, and you did the same thing to your daughter and she did the same thing to her daughter…unless you break it – jar the floor.

Would you bring your own family to see this?

Stephanie: I’m afraid of that. They’re coming, but I’m afraid of that, and I’m trying to prepare myself for that. This might open up some dialogue for us. My mom got pregnant when she was 15, a very young mother, and we practically grew up together the same way I see as you two (like Lola and MayDee) Because of that, there are certain things that she did not get to experience because of me, and so she lived vicariously through me in a way, and I made some decisions that she would not have made. So when we get together we love each other and it’s very obvious, but she starts to pick and I start to set her up. I can see my mom sitting out there with tears running down her face, and I can see her afterwards coming up to me and asking me: did you feel that way about me? I can see that. I’m waiting for that.

Becky: Not my youngest. He’s 14, but I feel that there are things that would come up that would freak him out, the possibility of a sexual molestation, things that he would get now that he might have not seen before. We’ve talked about homosexuality, I don’t think that would be a big issue, but incest… I would have loved my mother to see this, and to talk about this with her. It would have shocked the pants off her, but it would have raised some good issues, and it would have touched her heart.

DiAnna: My children are 4 and 6, so they’re not coming. I think it would be interesting if my parents did come, but I don’t know that it would be incredibly comfortable. This is SO not like my family of origin – it was never children yelling at parents. It was parents yelling: you need to do this, and you need to do this. So I think it would bring up very interesting issues.

Angela: ALL of my family will be there, GO GIRL, but not my brother, who is strangely enough more like a dad to me. He would be in shock. To hear me curse, he’d freak out or something. It would be very good for him; he’d never come.

Would you suggest an age limit?

Janet: I have a goddaughter who wants to come, and she’s 12, she’s very mature… I think it depends, on the child, on the parents.

How does Jar the Floor fit into Asheville On Broadway’s mission?

Janet: (AOB Co-founder) Greg Haller, wanted to do (Cheryl West’s) Jar the Floor. It was one of his dreams. The rights to this are not available – Spike Lee currently has those rights and is supposed to be making a film based on this script.

Jerry Crouch: The reason that Asheville On Broadway was first started was about healing. Opening wounds, certainly, but also about healing, about life-threatening diseases with emotions that can tear the whole family apart.

Many of you have worked together before, and been in previous AOB productions.

Janet: It helps that we love each other. There is no one on this earth that I trust more on stage than Becky Stone. If you fall back, she will catch you. There is a warmth to this group that is wonderful. I love that. It is like doing a play with your best friends.

DiAnna: Stephanie and Janet and I were in Last Year at Bluefish Cove last year. We already have this sense of: I know what you’re going to say; I know how you’re going to approach this. It is phenomenal to be a part of a group that has an established rhythm…You feel safe.

Asheville On Broadway’s Jar the Floor plays at Diana Worthem Theater Friday-Saturday evenings, December 5 and 6 at 8:00 p.m. and closes with a 2:30 matinee performance on Sunday December 7.