In the rehearsal of just one scene for the next Black Rep show, Kingsley Leggs was all about the eyes.
Actors who make the leap from the stage to the screen often talk about learning to act more with their eyes and their face.
Since the St. Louis native has racked up numerous television credits since he left town (not to mention originating the role of Mister in the Broadway run of The Color Purple), maybe he learned that kind of acting for the screen?
“No,” Leggs told the American. That’s just his thing. He’s an eyes guy.
“Sometimes, I have to dim my eyes down,” he said.
The eyes Leggs is peeping at his old home town have seen a lot since he left in 1989. He hasn’t been here since 1997, and his residence for the Black Rep’s production of Harlem Duet (April 23-May 18) will be his first extended stay in St. Louis since he boogied for Chicago.
He sees a different city now.
“Whoa!” he said.
“It’s wonderful to see the city thrive and do well. The city should be changing, because times are changing.”
The Normandy High School graduate still has his mother, Phyllis Young, here (she works for AmerenUE) and “lots of cousins.” Recently, he kicked it with some of the old Normandy crew, who are gearing up for their 30th anniversary reunion.
Leggs is changing, too, which is why he came home for awhile.
“What I’ve been doing is not fulfilling anymore,” he said.
“I’ve been in shows, moving from show to show. But as you live longer, you should be evolving. What you find important evolves.”
He’s not sure what his next evolution will be.
“That’s part of what this trip is going to be about,” he said.
It’s a return to the source, for sure.
“This place taught me everything,” Leggs said of the Black Rep.
“It taught me all areas of the theater and certainly equipped me to go out in the world and do well.”
His first-ever show anywhere was Don’t Bother Me, I Can’t Cope at the Black Rep in 1983. Since then, he has made most of his name (and money) in stage musicals. That’s one reason why he agreed to do Harlem Duet when producing director Ron Himes called him in Jersey City.
“I told him, ‘Yes, I’d love to do a play,’” Leggs said.
“I had no idea it would be such a great play.”
Written by African-Canadian playwright Djanet Sears, Harlem Duet is in one sense a meditation upon Shakespeare’s Othello. This is not a great selling point to mainstream black audiences. Though the play is complex – with three stories enfolded in one, set in three different eras – Sears has an ear for the things ordinary people talk (and fight) about.
Like sex, money, attention, space – you know. That stuff.
And, like, a black man having a white lady.
One of Leggs’ characters in the play defends his choice of new (white) mate to his former (black) mate. He says, “It’s nice not having to be mistaken for somebody’s inattentive father.”
Ouch!
His former black lover (Cherita Armstrong) says, “When white women were burning their bras, we were holding their (breasts) up!”
Ow!
She actually says a stronger word than “breast.” The play does have adult language. Leggs doesn’t want folks to be put off by that.
“The play raises a lot of interesting issues,” he said.
“Not just for black people – for all people.”
Harlem Duet, directed by Ron Himes, plays April 23- May 18 at the Grandel Theatre, 3610 Grandel Sq. Call (314) 534-3810 or visit www.theblackrep.org.
