The Jameses wanted to keep this immensely powerful and popular production in their repertory for their annual summer drama festival. Their second production about a longshoremen’s strike, Stevedore, changed everything. The Negro Repertory Company was originally conceived as a temporary unit, with the Jameses contracted to mount two productions in five months’ time.
Pairing their interest in theatre with their progressive social commitments, the Jameses suggested the creation of a Negro Unit for Region Five, with the Seattle Repertory serving as their sponsoring organization. Involvement with the Federal Theatre Project would bring much-needed economic support to their endeavor.
Though their productions were lauded for their artistic excellence, the Jameses struggled to make ends meet during the Depression. A talented actor/director combo, the Jameses were running an outstanding civic theatre, the Seattle Repertory, in the University district of Seattle. When Burton James failed to secure the directorship of the Federal Theatre Project for Region Five-a position that went to University of Washington professor Glenn Hughes-he and his wife, Florence James, dreamt up another way to be involved with the FTP. The brainchild of Florence and Burton James, the NRC provided opportunities for the development of African American theatre even as it was treated as a special yet unequal, part of Washington State’s theatre scene. African American companies operated under the federal program in several cities, but except for the New York unit, none were as well known or as produced as many plays as the Seattle Negro Repertory Company. Seattle ’s Negro Repertory Company was part of what made the region’s Federal Theatre Project so historically significant. (Courtesy of the University of Washington Library, Special Collections Division.) Shown here isĪ scene from the Negro Repertory Company's production of Stevedore. The Negro Repertory Company was one of the few all-African American theatre companies in the nation, and produced shows with other sections of the state Federal Theatre Project as well as their own, original productions.
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