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Voting as Theater: Race, Suffrage, and the Staging of the Civil Rights Movement

This essay explores the use of theater in defense of the right to vote. I focus in particular on dramatic works that followed conventional theatrical norms but in nonconventional settings and with the explicit purpose of advancing—and reimagining—the Civil Rights Movement. Analyzing such neglected works of civil rights drama offers a unique lens on the relationship between theater and the long African American Freedom Struggle—and on the borders of the Civil Rights Movement in both space and time. I explore three moments in the history of theatrical engagements with race and suffrage. First, I examine the performative nature of the voter registration drives of the mid-1950s. I next examine the performance of suffrage within the Mississippi Freedom Struggle in the early 1960s. Finally, in my conclusion, I connect these two moments within the Civil Rights era to contemporary productions staged in opposition to racial disfranchisement.