{"id":38458,"date":"2014-11-23T19:27:22","date_gmt":"2014-11-23T19:27:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/wordpress\/?p=38458"},"modified":"2017-05-05T15:47:54","modified_gmt":"2017-05-05T15:47:54","slug":"returning-to-an-impossible-role","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=38458","title":{"rendered":"Returning to an \u2018Impossible\u2019 Role"},"content":{"rendered":"

Returning to an \u2018Impossible\u2019 Role<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The New York Times<\/a>
\n2014-04-23<\/p>\n

Alexis Soloski<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Amber Gray on \u2018An Octoroon,\u2019 at Soho Rep<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Leaning against an upright piano, Amber Gray bent her voice and body to a song\u2019s harmonies \u2014 tapping her feet, drumming her fingers, bowing her head, and turtling her chin forward and back.<\/p>\n

A restless, dynamic performer, Ms. Gray recently appeared as the scheming H\u00e9l\u00e8ne in \u201cNatasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812<\/a>.\u201d She was now rehearsing for a much more innocent role: the title character of \u201cAn Octoroon<\/a>\u201d by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins<\/a>.<\/p>\n

A disquieting adaptation of Dion Boucicault\u2019s<\/a> controversial 1859 melodrama, which opens on May 4 at Soho Rep<\/a>, the play centers on a tragic love affair between the heir to a Louisiana<\/a> plantation and Ms. Gray\u2019s Zoe. Though raised as a decorous Southern lady, Zoe is one-eighth black<\/a>, an inheritance that condemns her to the slave auction block.<\/p>\n

After her musical rehearsal at the New 42nd Street Studios<\/a>, Ms. Gray, who has the sort of careless glamour that can make a Baja jacket<\/a> and acid-washed jeans seem very nearly elegant, retired to a futon in the green room. She spoke with Alexis Soloski about terrifying musicals, biracial identity and playing a difficult scene. These are excerpts from the conversation…<\/p>\n

…What was it like to grow up as a biracial child overseas?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I was too young to really understand a lot of it. In the military school systems, kids were mean. People would call me mulatto<\/a> all the time. My dad was like: \u201cDon\u2019t let people call you that. Say that you\u2019re mixed. Say that you\u2019re biracial.\u201d My parents were really careful with me. They were clear that you can\u2019t separate out the two sides. You\u2019d be denying half of yourself if you did.<\/p>\n

Before you became involved with \u201cAn Octoroon,\u201d did you read the 1859 version?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I did. I got really emotional reading it. It struck a chord. Most other mixed and biracial people I know have at least one secret or lie in their family, have at least one person who is choosing to pass<\/a> or is passing and doesn\u2019t even know it. That theme is so common. I have a half sister who didn\u2019t know she was half black until she was 11. I\u2019m interested in telling these stories because it is my family\u2019s history…<\/p>\n

Read the entire interview here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Amber Gray on \u2018An Octoroon,\u2019 at Soho Rep<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,24,13743,8,20],"tags":[18489,18490,18486,2640,2327,304],"class_list":["post-38458","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-arts","category-interviews","category-media-archive","category-usa","tag-alexis-soloski","tag-amber-gray","tag-branden-jacobs-jenkins","tag-new-york-times","tag-the-new-york-times","tag-the-octoroon"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38458","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=38458"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38458\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53815,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38458\/revisions\/53815"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=38458"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=38458"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=38458"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}