BONNIE
LEE MOSS RATTNER
To Gleam It Around,
To Show My Shine
Crossroads Theatre Company, New Brunswick, NJ
Based on the novel Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, To Gleam It Around, To Show My Shine is set in Eatonville, Florida, America's first incorporated all-black town. It tells the story of Janie Mae Crawford, whose passages from child-bride to thrice-married, self-actualized woman are chronicled in the distinctive folk dialect that made Ms. Hurston a household name.
Bonnie
Lee Moss Rattner was born and raised in Detroit. She attended the University
of Michigan and the Sorbonne, and received her degrees from Wayne State University.
After teaching high school English for several years, she returned to graduate
school, where she was assigned to read Their Eyes Were Watching God. The development
of To Gleam It Around, To Show My Shine took twenty years. Originally
produced at the Hilbery Theatre at Wayne State University in June 1983, To Gleam
was then given a staged reading by the Alliance Theatre for the Atlanta New
Play Project in 1985. Next came a reading at the Richard Allen Center in New
York, and then the Fund for New American Plays Award. Ms. Rattner has retired
from teaching English and drama on the college level and is currently involved
in writing the biography of Otis M. Smith, the first Black Supreme Court Justice
of Michigan and the first Black corporate officer of the General Motors Corporation,
where he retired as vice-president and general counsel. She is also selling
real estate. Bonnie Rattner is married to Lawrence Rattner, an attorney, and
they have a daughter, Mollie, who is a graduate in industrial design from the
Center for Creative Studies in Detroit.
Director: Rick
Khan
Set Designer: Dan Proett
Lighting Designer: Shirley Prendergast
Costume Designer: Judy Dearing
Sound Designer: Rob Groton
Featured Performers: Minnie Gentry, Marvin-Kazembe Jefferson, Novella
Nelson, Denise Nicholas, Adam Wade
Running Dates: October 1-30, 1988
