Davis and Dee to keynote dedication ceremony at IUB Jan. 18

‘National treasures’ to help launch new facility

On Friday, Jan. 18, Indiana University will formally dedicate the Department of Theatre and Drama Center and the Marcellus Neal and Frances Marshall Black Culture Center in an event on the Bloomington campus featuring noted actors, authors and social activists Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee.

The new building will provide the IU Bloomington Department of Theatre and Drama with performance and educational spaces for theater and dance, as well as gather under one roof the campus’ African-American arts organizations, cultural library and student and academic services.

The dedication ceremony will begin at 2 p.m. in the building’s Ruth N. Halls Theatre. The public is invited to the ceremony, and two other events are scheduled for the same day—a theater workshop in the morning and a free program that evening.

The Department of Theatre and Drama bade goodbye to the University Theatre last November with its final production, Samuel Beckett’s Waiting for Godot, and its T300 Studio Theatre stage soon will darken. Productions of William Shakespeare’s Much Ado about Nothing, and Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman, will inaugurate the new Wells-Metz and Halls theaters.

“This long awaited new home for theater and drama will set the standard for new theater education facilities in the nation, and at the same time, challenge this nationally ranked program to new heights of excellence in theater and drama education, scholarship and art,” said Leon Brauner, chairperson of the department.

The Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center, named for the first male and female African-American graduates of IU, likewise will celebrate the building’s opening with a series of special events. On Jan. 15, a new exhibit on the history and contributions of African Americans at IU will open. The campus’ annual Martin Luther King Jr. Day Lecture will be presented there four days after the dedication, and no less than three major lectures will take place there in February. The Black Student Union and other student organizations will offer a variety of educational and social programs throughout the semester.

“The dedication of the Neal-Marshall Black Culture Center marks an important milestone in the university’s history of creating a climate that supports the academic and personal success of African Americans and other under-represented students. It fulfills the vision of many former student leaders, administrators and alumni,” said Charlie Nelms, vice president for student development and diversity and Bloomington vice chancellor. The new building offers more than 97,000 square feet of usable space, including performance facilities, traditional classrooms, lecture halls, rehearsal studios, costume and scene shops, a library and administrative offices. The Department of Theatre and Drama will share the building with the African American Arts Institute and its performing groups—the IU Soul Revue, the African American Choral Ensemble and the African American Dance Company. The activities of the former Black Culture Center and the offices of Diversity Education and Community and School Partnerships will be housed there.

For more than half a century together, Davis and Dee have enriched American life as actors, writers, directors and producers, as well as being on the front lines as advocates for social justice.

During their visit, Davis and Dee will participate in several events with IU students and faculty. In addition to the building dedication, they will conduct an acting workshop with students and faculty at Willkie Auditorium and will discuss their life in the theater, in television and film, and social activism in a free program at the IU Auditorium. All will take place on Jan. 18, and will be open to the community.

Since meeting on Broadway in the 1946 production of Jeb, Davis and Dee have excelled as collaborators and as individuals (they married in 1948), and often broke new ground for African Americans. They made their film debuts in 1950 in No Way Out with Sidney Poitier, then starred together on Broadway in A Raisin in the Sun.

Davis and Dee have made appearances in several Spike Lee films, including Malcolm X—in which Davis played himself, having delivered the eloquent eulogy for the slain black leader in 1965—Jungle Fever, Do the Right Thing and Get on the Bus.

As close friends of Martin Luther King Jr., they served as masters of ceremonies for the historic 1963 march on Washington. Early on, they risked their careers resisting McCarthyism. Davis and Dee’s activism has led to their arrest for protesting the killing in New York of a Guinean immigrant, their suing in federal court for black voting rights, and their speaking out for citizen involvement in democracy and in support of sickle cell disease research.

Davis and Dee were celebrated as “national treasures” when they received the National Medal of Arts in 1995. In 2000, they were presented with the Screen Actors Guild’s highest honor, the Life Achievement Award. They received Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Silver Circle Award in 1994 and are inductees in the Theater Hall of Fame and the NAACP Image Awards Hall of Fame. Last year, they co-authored a joint autobiography, With Ossie and Ruby: In This Life Together.

For more about the new facility, visit this HP archival site:

http://www.iuinfo.indiana.edu/HomePages/100298/text/neal_marshall.htm