Scraps (Dramatists Play Services Inc.)
When Forest Winthrop, an unarmed black teenager, is shot and killed by a white police officer in Brooklyn, his friends, partner, and son struggle to cope in the aftermath of his death. A provocative explosion of theatrical norms, SCRAPS examines the grief, fury, and hunger for justice that endures long after a tragedy fades from the headlines.
Geraldine Inoa is a playwright and screenwriter. Her play SCRAPS had its world premiere production at the Flea Theater in New York City as part of its 2018/19 season, marking her professional debut. SCRAPS made its West Coast premiere at The Matrix Theatre in Los Angeles during summer 2019. In 2022, SCRAPS was published by Dramatists Play Service, and she was awarded a playwriting commission through Center Through Group for the Not A Moment But A Movement initiative. As a playwright, she is an alumnus of The Public Theater's Emerging Writers Group and the inaugural recipient of The Shonda Rhimes Unsung Voices Playwriting Commission. She is a L. Arnold Weissberg New Play Award finalist, a P73 Playwriting Fellowship finalist, and a twice-named Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights Conference semifinalist. Her work has been developed at the Atlantic Theater Company, the Labyrinth Theater Company, and the Victory Gardens Theater. TV credits include AMC’s The Walking Dead & CW’s Charmed. She holds a B.A. from New York University’s Gallatin School of Individualized Study. She is a Gates Millennium Scholar.
Ikechúkwú Onyewuenyi is a Nigerian Australian curator and writer based in Los Angeles, with research interests that dovetail across performance and performativity in new (digital) media, epistemology of the photographic image, and African aesthetics in the diaspora. He is a curatorial assistant at Hammer Museum, UCLA. His writing has appeared in Afterimage: The Journal of Media Arts and Media Culture, ARTS.BLACK, BLOUIN ARTINFO, Carla, OnCurating, and Performa Magazine, among others.
Praise for Scraps -
"This ambitious, vibrant new play—written by Geraldine Inoa and directed by Niegel Smith—is performed without an intermission, but it has two distinct, contrasting acts. The first is set on a trash-strewn stoop in Bed-Stuy, four months after the shooting of a black teen-ager from the neighborhood by a white cop. A series of beautifully written scenes involving four people who were close to the young man—played by Roland Lane, Tanyamaria, Alana Raquel Bowers, and Michael Oloyede, all members of the Bats ensemble—powerfully and passionately convey the sadness, anger, tension, and despair of the tragedy." - The New Yorker
"Ms. Inoa, a playwright to watch melds various styles here, moving from the rap opener to a naturalistic first act. The second act...shifts into the unsettling, urgently heightened landscape of Sebastian's nightmare. You can feel the influences here — Branden Jacobs-Jenkins, Spike Lee and James Scruggs come to mind — Ms. Inoa nonetheless uses them in service of her own sharp vision." - The New York Times
"A passionate new voice screaming to be heard." - Time Out New York
“The play is gloriously black. It welcomes people from all cultural and racial backgrounds, but lets us know we're guests in this space. The characters in Inoa's Brooklyn aren't there to educate or enlighten white people, they're not there to be mere morality tales, they're there to exist, to be given opportunities they might not be given in real life. They are there to be listened, not argued or conversed with.” - Talkin’ Broadway
"BRILLIANT, POWERFUL… at the cutting edge of the stage and screen cycle of productions reacting to the surge of police and vigilante killings of African Americans and/or the judicial system’s unjust mistreatment of Blacks… among the best of these works….rated: BRAVO!” — Ed Rampell, Hollywood Progressive
“...Magnificently written and directed… We can only hope society can change for the better thanks to such thought provoking work by artist destined for greatness… A show not to miss.” — Broadway World
“Stunning… [a] remarkable ensemble of actors. Miss Inoa's voice isn't one you've heard in the theater before but if we're going to make sense of racism and the violence against innocent black men, hers is an essential voice.” — KCRW 89
“Provocative… Inoa’s language is authentic and often raw, both lofty and nightmarish… Stevie Walker-Webb does deeply committed work directing this increasingly hallucinatory confection…. A forceful play about slavery’s legacy” “This is unforgettable theater” — People’s World
“Bold, timely hotblooded… This important, extraordinary, affecting play, featuring a superb cast of actors given keen direction by Stevie Walker~Webb, must be seen.” — Theatre Notes