Group Acts Irate at Official Rejection of Black ‘Romeo’

A group of Orange County actors and art activists staged a 10-minute protest Friday night against a community theater board’s refusal to allow a black actor to portray Romeo in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet.”

About 35 members of the Orange County Coalition for Freedom joined the actors at Portola Park in La Habra on opening night of the play “to make a point,” organizers said. The group objected to a decision by the La Habra Community Theatre board, which overturned the director’s original plan to cast a black Romeo, said Joe Felz, one of the protest organizers.

“The community theater is supposed to talk about things that must be discussed in society. The board of directors of La Habra Community Theatre have essentially cut off that voice. This is what the protest is about,” said Ellen Aliberti, who took part in the 10-minute skit mocking the theater board’s decision.

Theater board members voted in an emergency meeting in August to reject director Marla Gam-Hudson’s proposal to cast a black actor as Romeo. After the meeting, Gam-Hudson told The Times that while the board was intrigued by her idea, it was concerned that some of the community’s “predominantly older” audience “would not easily accept a mixed racial relationship” in the play. All cast members in the play are white.

Gam-Hudson had said that the purpose of the nontraditional casting was to comment on bigotry.

Board members said that their decision was not racial, noting that the community theater has staged numerous multiracial productions in the past.

The actors in the protest skit, staged near the entrance of the La Habra Depot Playhouse, wore placards representing board members Jeanne Diamond and Cathy Furrer, who led the decision not to cast a black actor.

Automobile headlights were used for lighting the outdoor play, and the dialogue was taken from actual quotes of board members that appeared in newspaper articles concerning their action.

Black actor Reggie Zachary played Romeo in the skit, and male actor Michael Carr played Juliet.

But about 100 people paid little attention to the protesters as they entered the theater to see “Romeo and Juliet.”

“I don’t understand what these people (the protesters) are complaining about. I think the board had to make a decision in reflection of our community,” said theatergoer James Harley.