THEATRE + COMEDY

Coretta Scott King award-winner and Newbery Medal award-winner Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis has been dramatized for the stage and is coming to Main Street Theater during Black History Month. Performances are on Saturdays, February 7, 14 and 21 at 1:00pm, and 4:00pm.

NOTE:  Playwright Reginald André Jackson is flying into Houston for the Houston premiere of his play. Mr. Jackson will be in attendance for the 4pm performance on Saturday, February 7 and will participate in a talkback following the show.

About Bud, Not Buddy
In Flint, Michigan in 1936, Bud (not Buddy) is filled with such determination and strength of spirit that even the Great Depression can’t keep him down! After all, he has his very own suitcase filled with his important, special things, and he's the “author” of Bud Caldwell's Rules and Things for Having a Funner Life and Making a Better Liar Out of Yourself. Using some of the clues his Momma left him, Bud runs away from an abusive foster family to look for the man who might be his father. On his search he finds more than he could have possibly imagined. From award-winning author Christopher Paul Curtis (The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963), Bud, Not Buddy has been awarded the Newbery Medal and the Coretta Scott King Awards among many others.

About Author Christopher Paul Curtis
Christopher Paul Curtis (born May 10, 1953) is a Newbery Medal winner who wrote the The Watsons Go to Birmingham: 1963 and the critically acclaimed Bud, Not Buddy. Bud, Not Buddy is the first novel to receive both the Coretta Scott King Award and the Newbery Medal. His newest book, entitled Elijah of Buxton, is set in a free Black community in Ontario that was founded in the 1849 by runaway slaves. Curtis was born in Flint, Michigan, the partial setting of many of his books. After school, Curtis worked for 13 years on a General Motors assembly line. He and his wife, Kaysandra (a native of Trinidad and Tobago) have two children, Steven and Cydney. They currently live in Windsor, Ontario. 

Says Curtis, “To me the highest accolade comes when a young reader tells me, ‘I really liked your book.’ The young seem to be able to say ‘really’ with a clarity, a faith, and an honesty that we as adults have long forgotten. That is why I write.”

About Playwright Reginald André Jackson
Reginald André Jackson is proud to have been chosen to adapt two of Christopher Paul Curtis’ novels. Bud, Not Buddy and The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963, which had its regional premiere at Main Street Theater last season.

Other works adapted for the stage by Mr. Jackson include Mark Mathabane’s Kaffir Boy and a collection of true-life accounts by victims, refugees, activists, reporters and aid workers, concerning the horrible crisis in and around Darfur, titled Darfur Stories. As an actor Reggie has performed extensively at theatres both inside and outside Seattle, Washington where he now lives. These include Seattle Repertory Theatre (Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, Romeo and Juliet, The Cider House Rules) ACT Theatre (A Christmas Carol), Seattle Shakespeare Company (King Lear, Hamlet, Macbeth, Merchant of Venice, Julius Caesar, Much Ado About Nothing, Pericles), Seattle Children’s Theatre (Holes, Magic City, When I Grow Up I’m Gonna Get Some Big Words), and the Tahoe Shakespeare Festival (Othello, Twelfth Night). In addition to his stage work, Mr. Jackson has considerable experience working in arts and education programs including Intiman Theatre’s award-winning Living History Program and Freehold Theatre’s Engaged Theatre Program that takes Shakespeare plays to area prisons.

About the Production
Daria James returns to direct Bud after directing last season’s The Watsons Go to Birmingham – 1963 and the touring production of Winnie-the-Pooh earlier this season at MST. Ms. James has previously been seen onstage at the Youth Theater, most recently as Grace in Junie B. Jones and a Little Monkey Business.

The cast includes Falecia Dunn, Greg Hall, Darrell T. Joe, Rocfielle Living, Norelia Reed, Steve Scott, and George Harris as Bud.
The design team includes Liz Freese (set design), Meghan C. Hakes (lighting design), Macy Perrone (costume design), Chris Bakos (sound design), and Richard Solis (properties design). Caroline Scott is the Production Stage Manager.

Recommended for 5th Grade and up.

Children under the age of 3 not allowed in the theater.