King, Malcolm X Meet Again--Onstage : Arts: Civil-rights leaders reunite during theater’s first production that deals exclusively with black subject matter.

The two top leaders of America’s civil-rights movement--the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X--met only long enough to shake hands.

But a fictional rendezvous between the two men, whose outlooks on race relations were sometimes diametrically opposed, is taking place in Monrovia this week.

It’s a stage production called “The Meeting,” by Jeff Stetson, at the Monrovia Center Theatre. It will be presented at 8 tonight and Friday and at 2 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $10.

Although almost 10% of Monrovia residents are African-American, “The Meeting” is the first play by the theater that deals with black subject matter, said Damon J. Bryant, the show’s director.

Bryant, who has been acting professionally for five years, said he has long been troubled by the absence of black themes and black audience members in community theater.

“This is the story throughout California and the nation with theater,” said Bryant, who recently moved to San Dimas from San Diego.

“The theaters just do not develop subscribers in the black community,” he said. “It seems to me that a theater in the middle of a black community ought to market itself to that community.”

Bryant, who plays a minor character in “The Meeting,” sought assistance from City Hall in developing a potential audience for the production, which plays on the theater’s cabaret stage.

He began with a listing of Monrovia’s black churches, businesses and organizations supplied to him by the city’s community development director. He also contacted several African-American city employees, including Fire Chief Ernest Mitchell and the local representative of the National Assn. for the Advancement of Colored People.

“It’s led to a whole lot of support,” said Bryant, who is compiling a list of potential regular subscribers for the theater.

Norman Bowman, one of the theater’s founders, said he is excited about the production. “There has been a lot of interest. The telephone is really ringing,” he said.

He was approached about the show three months ago by Darryl Blackshere, a Monrovia actor and stand-up comic who for several years has shifted moods at the end of his comedy routine to perform snippets of the play.

Blackshere plays Malcolm X in “The Meeting.” Comedian Ken Sagoes will play King.

“We started talking about the play, and then he gave me the script,” Bowman recalled. “I thought it might be something that would work on our cabaret stage. It’s got the potential to be good for the black community and good for the white community.”

The play, as Bryant described it, outlines the conflicting philosophies of the two leaders: one a militant black Muslim who came to believe violence was the only solution to discrimination; the other a Christian minister dedicated to nonviolence.

“These were two young guys, swamped by the press, who found themselves representing all of the black people in America,” he said. “The idea is that they had a secret meeting, with Malcolm kidnaping Martin Luther King to get him alone long enough to talk to him.”

Although the supposed meeting takes place in 1965 or 1966, Bryant said the topics the two men discuss and the conclusions they reach about the future of blacks in America are still relevant today.

“They were prophetic men,” Bryant said. “To see this play is to see that they predicted the unrest that happened in L.A. If you live in Southern California, you will recognize what you hear them say.”