{"id":57280,"date":"2019-01-12T03:28:51","date_gmt":"2019-01-12T03:28:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/?p=57280"},"modified":"2019-01-12T03:28:51","modified_gmt":"2019-01-12T03:28:51","slug":"lynette-linton-why-are-we-not-marching-in-the-streets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=57280","title":{"rendered":"Lynette Linton: ‘Why are we not marching in the streets?’"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lynette Linton: ‘Why are we not marching in the streets?’<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

The Guardian<\/a>
\n2019-01-02<\/p>\n

Bridget Minamore<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/a>
\nLynette Linton<\/a>, incoming artistic director of the Bush Theatre<\/a> in London<\/a>, photographed during rehearsals for Sweat<\/em><\/a>. Photograph: David Levene for the Guardian<\/em><\/small><\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Fuelled by passion and outrage, the playwright and director is shaking up theatre with works about Windrush<\/a> to an all-women-of-colour <\/em>Richard II<\/a> \u2013 and now she\u2019s taking over the Bush<\/a> in London<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Lynette Linton<\/a> is known for her deep love of Michael Jackson<\/a>. The director and playwright has said that, in a parallel universe, her ideal job would be the King of Pop\u2019s backup dancer. When I ask her why she loves him so much, she replies as though the answer is obvious. Jackson, she says, was a theatremaker. \u201cIf you watch his performances, that\u2019s a show, it\u2019s an experience. Everything from his toe to his eyebrow was activated, and you want your audiences to faint like they did when they saw him.\u201d Does she want the audience for Sweat<\/em><\/a>, her current production at the Donmar Warehouse<\/a> in London<\/a>, to faint in the aisles? Linton laughs, and points out that Sweat\u2019s<\/em> playwright, Lynn Nottage<\/a>, has signed on to write the book for a forthcoming Broadway musical<\/a> about Jackson. Everything, it seems, is connected.<\/p>\n

To many in British theatre, Linton is one of the industry\u2019s friendliest and most exciting figures. As an assistant director she has worked with Kwame Kwei-Armah<\/a> and Michael Grandage<\/a>; she has been an associate director of the Gate<\/a> in Notting Hill<\/a>, and she has written for both Theatre Royal Stratford East<\/a> and the Arcola<\/a> in east London<\/a>, her plays exploring mixed-race identity (2017\u2019s Hashtag Lightie<\/em><\/a>), queerness (2013\u2019s Step<\/em>) and inner-city London\u2019s chicken shops (2015\u2019s Chicken Palace<\/em>)…<\/p>\n

…Much of Linton\u2019s work has touched on who she is and where she comes from, with her forthcoming Windrush films a tribute to her mixed British Caribbean heritage. \u201cMy dad is from Guyana<\/a>, and he sat me and my brother down [as children] and was like, \u2018You are black, the world will see you as black.\u2019\u201d The Windrush scandal<\/a> is something that has affected her deeply. \u201cI spoke to theatre people, saying, \u2018Why are we not responding to this? Why are we not in the streets marching?\u2019 They\u2019re sending families home. It makes me feel sick.\u201d Linton\u2019s voice shakes a little. \u201cEven now, it chokes me. The people they\u2019re targeting are elders, man. People are having heart attacks and have died because of this.\u201d Still, her films \u2013 which are to be screened at the Royal Court<\/a> in London \u2013 will have \u201ca massive celebration at the core. It was really important to me that we took over a building and celebrated West Indian culture.\u201d…<\/p>\n

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

Fuelled by passion and outrage, the playwright and director is shaking up theatre with works about Windrush to an all-women-of-colour Richard II \u2013 and now she\u2019s taking over the Bush in London<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12,24,8,26,10],"tags":[29252,29253,26154,2103],"class_list":["post-57280","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-articles","category-arts","category-media-archive","category-politics","category-uk","tag-bridget-minamore","tag-bush-theatre","tag-lynette-linton","tag-the-guardian"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57280","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=57280"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57280\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":57282,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57280\/revisions\/57282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=57280"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=57280"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=57280"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}