 You can do anything you preach your mind to So don't confine you, your conditions don't define you, you're much greater I was in prison, still mentally conditioned to believe What some music was the only way I could be seen As successful, I better yet as a human being Internalization, limitations, up to your what I seen As the reality, I'm not working what I could achieve I didn't believe I could work for myself and I was not being free Look at me now, 100% self-employed Fresh out the pen with a plan, here we makin' noise I thank God 3D put me under this wing It took the time to teach me so many of them things Learnin' business from them IRS packers Did different entities, I had to navigate them tax-free As the reality, I'm not working what I could be seen I didn't know we had them options mobbin' till I rest in peace I thought was the only option, thought that was best for me Now I feel so blessed to see A lot of minds internalize limitations Due to our conditions, we've been conditioned not to see our greatness How can you grow when you don't know your roots Oppression disconnected, our identity literally we can do Anything we put our mind to Your conditions do not define you You can do anything you put your mind to So don't confine you, your conditions don't define you You're much greater Thank you so much for attending tonight's event My name is Rachel Jet and I serve as the artistic director of the National Theater Institute here at the Eugene O'Neill Theater Center and I use the pronoun she, her, hers The O'Neill gratefully acknowledges that its campus sits on land that was cared for by the Mohegan Mashantucket Pequot Eastern Pequot and the Hentuck tribes for generations We honor and respect these nation's peoples and their enduring relationship to this land I am joined tonight by actor, educator and longtime friend of the O'Neill, Patrice D. McClain Hi, Patrice, you're muted 2020, how about now? There we go. Hello, everyone. And again, thank you so much for joining us as we kick off another place to progress event You know, Nina Simone says it's an artist's duty to reflect the times and in light of the current times, I have been inspired to find more ways to lend my voice and my artistry to the struggles that we all find ourselves facing in the American theater and being both black and female I feel a huge obligation to not only acknowledge the problems but to also help to find solutions and it's an honor to work with the O'Neill in any capacity They can call me up anytime but I can't think of a more important role than the one I'm in right now which is working as an arts engagement strategist to help the institution navigate its way through its anti-racism action plan In white American theater, the inequities and underrepresentation has become increasingly more apparent but I'm very proud of the O'Neill for beginning to take the necessary steps to ignite real change and the implementation of this place to progress series is the first step of many Thank you so much, Patrice. It's such an honor to be with you here tonight And thank you, everyone. We are so happy that you are here for the second gathering of this new place to progress series This series is a moment where we gather artists, local community leaders, national organizers, and audiences to use art and new plays specifically those developed at the O'Neill to really have a conversation with one another about local and national actions surrounding the Black Lives Matter and other social justice movements It's also a platform in which we seek to uplift and engage with work created by black, indigenous, and artists of color who drew from and contributed greatly to the Waterford and New London communities So we will take questions from the audience at the end of the reading and the panel discussion Please feel free to add them in the Q&A feature throughout You are also welcome to use the chat to add any comments or echo phrases or ideas that resonate with you throughout the panel You can look to the chat bar to also catch the bios and a little more information about each of our speakers And now the play that brings us here tonight is Lockdown by the Amazing Corey Thomas Please allow me to introduce you to our playwright of the hour Welcome Corey! Corey's Longer Bio will be copied into the chat feature but we're thrilled to have Corey back as an alum of the 2018 National Playwrights Conference She also serves as a faculty member for NTI Thank you Corey Lockdown was here developed at the Edith Oliver Theater and was directed by Kent Gash It received its world premiere at the Rattlestick Playwrights Theater in New York in the spring of 2019 I still remember the first time I heard it here Corey It still lives with me and it's been such an honor to see its sort of journey and to see it again at Rattlestick Do you mind sharing with us a bit about the seed of the play its journey so far and a bit about the developmental process Yes, I'm so thrilled to be back at the O'Neill you know albeit virtually This play was birthed I would say the first time I walked into a prison which was San Quentin State Prison It was September of 2016 and I went in there with two producers regarding a podcast that was going to happen that didn't even end up happening but when I was there I met a gentleman who's incarcerated who told me about a program and I ended up actually volunteering with that program and I've been doing that for the last four years so it was kind of a roundabout way The reason the play started though was that before I walked into the prison I am ashamed now to admit that I had low expectations of the people that I would meet there I mean I wasn't afraid or anything like that but I did walk in there not expecting a whole lot and all of my expectations were dashed and I was shocked I was ashamed but I was mostly shocked that I didn't realize the level the caliber of people who are incarcerated in this country and I realize that that is probably because of media images that we've become accustomed to seeing we don't actually see the humanity and we don't learn about the humanity of people who are incarcerated so you kind of have a tendency to sort of just think prison is a place where bad people are and there's this sort of fear mongering that happens in the media even like newspaper titles of the stories and that sort of thing So anyway I felt so bad about my initial reaction to the people that I just wanted to write something to maybe other people you know to kind of show what I had come to know to try to honor the people I've come to know but also to try to share what I've come to know because I realized like I was wrong so there's a lot of people who are wrong too so that's it really Thank you and your play goes so far in bridging what you're talking about that sort of massive misconception about who the incarcerated are for some of our audiences who are less familiar with the play itself could you share a brief synopsis of the play with us? Yeah I mean I don't think that I'm qualified to actually speak to the actual experience of incarceration because I haven't personally been incarcerated and I think people with lived experience should be the people who tell their own stories but I did I wanted to be accurate and I wanted to be authentic and so I mean I use a volunteer like myself going into a prison so that therefore the audience sort of journeys through the play through the eyes of this volunteer which is to me the most respectful way to tell this story but I did get so much input from the men there who I work with and have come to know and care so much about while I was writing I mean there's a man who I work with who's been there he's in his 44th year of incarceration and he read every single draft and others in fact somebody who's on the panel later will tell you how he was so you know in a little bit involved in the whole thing so people sort of helped me out one man gave me vocabulary lessons so I would get the prison slang thing right everyone sort of participated and helped me to make sure that I was accurate which is what I wanted so it's a story of a volunteer who goes into a prison and meets a man who's preparing for his 14th parole hearing and I guess that's the best introduction I can give and I know we're going to start sort of a little bit into the play it's not going to be right at the beginning so great thank you so much and I think the person you're referring to who you worked with alongside who's been in San Guen for 44 years is Lonnie Morris is that right? Yes, yes, yes, yes so if you're one in our audience just know you can hear Lonnie Morris speak you can watch Lonnie Morris speak on the YouTube channel I think some of it is shared also on some of the O'Neill social media and I would encourage everyone to hear Lonnie Morris speak yes so now we're going to hear the entirety of scene six so Ernie is a successful volunteer and successful novelist and volunteer at the prison mentoring Wise a man who has been incarcerated for 46 years on his speech for his upcoming parole hearing Wise is a father figure a friend and a mentor to many of the young men in prison particularly with Clue a young aspiring rapper and so before we dive into the conversation about the play we wanted to bring a bit of the O'Neill staged reading experience to your living room we have some fabulous alums of the National Playwrights Conference and the National Theater Institute to help us realize Corey's wonderful words the actors will introduce themselves and the roles they are playing and their bios will appear in the chat Hi, I'm Patrice D. McClain and I'll be reading the part of Ernie Hi, I'm Victor Williams he and his I have a pleasure of reading wise today Hey y'all, my name is Sam Cabetta he, him, his and I'll be reading for Clue Hi, my name is Alize Powell she, her, hers and I'll be reading stage directions Scene six Ernie and Wise sit at the table in the work room he is making coffee Ernie looks around then takes a sugar sugar packet out of her pocket want to share that sweetness a little rough on my taste buds we're not supposed to give me that here quick he quickly tears the packet sprinkle some of the sugar in his cup and hands her the packet he puts the rest in her cup and stirs he drinks now that is what a cup of coffee is supposed to taste like thank you truth is I did it for myself I hate that sweet girl we lost our sugar in honey seven years ago man I miss honey so much you want me to bring you some they have these little squeeze packets nah it's not a good idea I see you don't care about the rules in here no I do I just don't think a pack of sugar that serious is it they cast me with the sugar that's a write-up and cost me my parole it can send me to the hole it could get me transferred to a level four maximum security prison I didn't know you break a rule and you with me I'm the one to get to 115 and they won't let you come in here no more oh I'm sorry not the same in here as it is out there thank you for this it tastes right so I was thinking we should we should be sure to mention your causative factors she hands him a notebook and pen he may or may not actually write anything she may gesture he should write from time to time they're psych vows in my file they can tell they tell my entire story okay but maybe we should list the highlights the highlights you make us sound like a movie or something oh I think we should think of it like that we pick the most interesting and best examples of what made you do what you did who you were when you got here when I got here 46 years ago I was on my way to getting murked what getting body getting killed even after I got in here took me years to transform coming up I was stopped out drugging drinking fighting con and hustling running the streets from my homeboys our mission was to let everybody know they could get hurt or die messing with us we didn't care about no one and we would say we didn't care about no one and we were not supposed to have feelings about nothing homeboy killed bobo in front of you keep stepping and don't say nothing to nobody I think I was he I was coming home from the store with an ice cream somebody shot a duty fell right in front of me I kept licking my ice cream stepped over him and went home hood rules say boys ain't supposed to cry somebody shoot your cousin get over your mama dead get over it my mama died when I was 13 I didn't even know she was sick had to go hide under the house to cry so nobody could see me I mean this one time I get there my brother's already down there crying himself I busted him we kind of busted each other both of us hide it so nobody can catch us crying you crying no I'm not you crying no I'm not don't tell nobody I ain't saying nothing to nobody both of us sniffing and wiping our nose and eyes with our t-shirts so you went down the wrong track because your mom died no when I was five six I was already getting sent to the principal's office sent home detention expelled matter of fact the first time they sent me to the juvenile hall I was nine and they stabbed somebody why I was protecting my homie and I knew how to use a knife but at age nine yeah did he die no and it was self-defense that's a lot yesterday so okay let's let's pretend you're introducing yourself to the parole board okay go my name is James Hakeem James yeah you sound stiff I just started let's start again how many people are there last time there were four people Mr. Jamerson would you please tell us about yourself my name is James Hakeem Jamerson I am 62 years old I was born February 11 1957 this should I say here that I was convicted and came to prison when I was old when I was 16 you could say when I was 16 I was convicted and da da da da when I was 16 I was sentenced no sorry I was I was convicted no that's wrong oh okay hey stop stop you're nervous and there's no reason to be I'm not nervous yet you are I'm not you are now take a deep breath do it breathe thank you one more yeah okay now let's start over what happened the last time start at the beginning blow by ball walk in and I face the commissioner the deputy da the rest of the panel they're all sitting in front of me on the other side of this long table Joan my lawyer Joan Hornig is sitting right next to me on my right victims family as far as to the right their eyes be shooting bullets at me and I can feel every one of them I'm not supposed to look at them in fact I try not to look at nobody directly because I know I'm at their mercy and it makes me feel even more nervous I know that their eyes I know that in their eyes I'm nothing so I'm standing there and I say good morning thank you for this opportunity my name is James Hakeem Jamison and I'm speaking to you today to say I am not the same boy as 16 that I was when I got here and I wish I didn't have to speak to you today I know the difference between right and wrong after all these years that I've been incarcerated thank you for this opportunity and I went to sit and then I realized damn I forgot to say the most important thing so I say I'm sorry but I forgot something I want to say to the family and I look at them I know I'm not supposed to I know that they hate me but they've been quiet this time compared to the other times and I look at these I look and they're looking at me with hatred and I forget what I want to say I forget how to talk and finally I just say I'm sorry Chairperson say Mr. Jamison don't look over there look here that's when the family starts saying you're a monster we're not safe with somebody like you free in the streets Chairperson calls them no order so the chair says to me you got anything further to say and I say no ma'am she suddenly say Mr. Jamison why did you do it the minute I say that my heart sank and I knew I blew it again they dismiss this so they can deliberate we go outside and say Joan she say this is there's still a chance your file is great not everybody has a letter of support from the warden but I know and she know they call this back and about an hour later and give me their denial of parole that fast that's the one positive thing about a parole here and it's dispensed on last too long Mr. Jamison we find you unsuitable you haven't convinced us that you feel remorse for your crime nor do we believe you understand your causative factors I've heard them say that shit 13 times now before I know it it's like I'm watching myself and I'm trying I'm trying not to stop I'm trying to stop myself but it's too late I say look I'm not a child I know what I did was wrong if you read my file you will realize that and chairperson say do not raise your voice in here Mr. Jamison I'm sorry the period of denial is five years that was it your statement like details there's no indication that you think or care about anything for one thing you should probably start with what you did why they know what I did well I think if you say it like you're taking responsibility and start like that it will have an impact we're here to figure out an interesting way to get to the meat of this the meat of it what do you mean what do you mean my meat what I mean I mean the point of your statement right the the thing that will prove to them that you're different in some way wouldn't you expect someone who's 62 to be different from a 16 year old it's not about what I expect yes I would expect it it's what they want what they want what they want it's political they don't want anything but the enjoyment of telling me no still humor me hmm tell me how you're different how is it political you don't seem to be in the statement writing mood today I ain't never in that kind of mood I know you've been through this 13 times but you're also still here so clearly something's wrong and I can tell you that based on what I just heard I wouldn't let you out myself because you didn't say anything I shouldn't even have to say anything look I shouldn't even have to be here the everything they need is in my records all they want to talk about is what happened 46 years ago over and over and over the amount of time they spend going over what happened they spend almost no time or who I am now what I've done what I want to do look I just want to what what to leave yeah I want you to leave too and I'm trying to help you now you ask for my help and I'm trying to do that and you're not cooperating I know you don't like it tough it has to be done so let's do it let's do it my way this time you fail we go back to the old way the 15th time you bossy as hell you know that yeah I know it but if you want my help you have to deal with it I just want to go home and prove I've changed hold on clue oxen clue where you've been at you said you was coming to class last night JB said you told him you was coming too that's the second time now the chronos were reflected and you won't get your credit I've been busy busy doing what we in prison take this is Ernie she the lady wrote that story about the the refrigerator man oh yeah hey hi I need to talk to you what what's going on nothing it's not nothing last week you stopped coming to class and look at you I could smell the weed on you before you walked in the door you've been listening to anything I've been saying in the class what if you don't watch out you want to end up you want to end up like me what's going on nothing you got a lot of talent in you youngster I like to listen to you spit you good you're trying to say something put me in the mind of pop yeah why are you tripping man I ain't tripping you you don't know me I know you like I know myself look where you going but at least give me the respect to let me to tell to let me say what I gotta say look I know something's going on oh no shit what man at least be a man and talk to me my little brother's in jail right now for murder he's 12 come here little bro come here I got you you hear me I got you I got you I got you I got you does he have a lawyer because I have a friend who's a lawyer maybe she can help him you see thank you Ernie yeah who's responsible for me if I was there I would I would not have let him do what he did you know that's why he ended up where he's at now ain't nobody else he ever listened to but me what's his name Tray Sean Burke how can I find out information so I can help him I can give you the number to my uncle when he call you he'll tell you where they got Tray here now I'm gonna help Tray okay come to class 5 30 you know you have to get out your number like that right yeah how can I help him if I don't I have to help him okay okay is there any hope there is so much hope you wouldn't believe it end of scene thank you Sam Victor Patrice and Alize for transporting us into the world of Corey's work it's my pleasure to introduce our amazing and illustrious panelists their bios will also be posted in the chat feature Robbie Pollock joins us Robbie is a visual artist a singer songwriter and pin america's prison writing programs manager pin america stands at the intersection of literature and human rights for more than four decades in america's prison writing program has amplified the writings of thousands of imprisoned writers by providing free resources skilled mentors and audiences for their writing the writing for justice fellowship has launched two years of fellow's work into major publications in response to the pandemic pin launched temperature checks COVID-19 behind bars a new rapid response series featuring original creative reportage by incarcerated writers accompanied by podcast interviews with Chris criminal justice reform experts on the pandemic's impact in united states prisons please read more about that I'd also like to welcome Eric Maserati e Abercrombie Eric is a musical artist a filmmaker and a justice reform activist Eric was released from San Quentin stank prison in august of 2019 after serving nine years while incarcerated Eric was part of the original development team of a restorative justice pilot program which is currently being implemented in San Joaquin county he's also featured several times on the infamous podcast ear hustle check it out all six seasons it's amazing also he worked as a filmmaker for a media project in San Quentin stank prison called first watch founded by Adnan Khan where he and a team of incarcerated men created films from pre to post production humanizing the incarcerated and utilizing the power of the narrative giving the currently incarcerated a platform where their truths of what it is like to be incarcerated can be seen and heard he was also a lead facilitator of a youth mentor group called power source since released Eric has spoken at state capital worked with the restorative justice organization restored justice and is now currently on tour with Antoine Bakes Williams the co-creator and sound designer of the podcast ear hustle ear hustle performing music and telling his stories at schools to corrode the school to prison pipeline as well as educate and empower the young people thank you so much for being here Eric and Robbie and welcome back Corey thank you for all the work you're doing thank you to start our chat we usually like to ask our panelists to share a moment a line or a character that deeply resonates with them and you've seen the play a few times some of our audience hasn't seen the whole play I'll kick it off briefly by saying a moment that's deeply embedded with me is when the older wise is telling the story of his younger self running from the police before he's arrested at age 16 and opening that car door and huddling in the the floorboard of that car praying praying that they go by and that moment is a moment where I find myself praying alongside young wise so making me want to jump on your moment you sold it so well Rachel I don't know do you want to go first uh yeah I think um the moment that that really hit me um is when he kind of broke down and really explained what was going on as far as like what uh clue what clues little brother um who was incarcerated at 12 for murder like I can kind of relate to that um I was incarcerated at the age of 17 all the way till I was 26 for nine years and it was multiple people I went through the juvenile system first and foremost from juvenile hall to CYA two prison and I can just relate so much being there at such an early age and seeing people that literally was 12 11 13 up to the age that I was at the time like in there for murder really like fighting life and all that and how just scary that is you know what I mean not really grasping are like the consequences of our actions and things of that nature at that age so like for somebody that's older to see somebody going through that while being incarcerated is just so unnerving on so many different levels so like that definitely hit me yeah I think for me to that central piece of like um I did nine and a half years in prison and at least more than half of that I had kind of a wise like attitude just let me out this is stupid like what what is going on and the challenge in this play that really really resonates with me is this uh there's injustice that's happening to me simultaneously I have to face the harms that I've caused to society as well so when you're in a position of victimization and you victimize it really puts you in a like a very strange place to have to negotiate from and not to like wrap it up with a pretty little bow but one of the lessons from wise's journey that has stuck with me is that resolving that dilemma can't happen in isolation so it's when we create these the open vulnerable trusting connections like Ernie has with wise that we start to solve and unpack some of this riddle and we're seeing that about race and justice in this country and we're seeing that in institutions in that that unpacking that connection from top and bottom from a vulnerable place it's really powerful yeah thank you one thing we talked about earlier that you mentioned Robbie is the relationship between a visitor coming in um in the kind of and it's also it seems to be wrapped up in this idea that you just presented this idea of mentorship of outside um outside observations coming into the internal observations but also integral to the play are the conversations all the men have um with one another can you two talk a bit about both the mentorship maybe you received but also the your ongoing you're now mentors to a number of people uh how that began for you how you knew when it was time for you to take that mantle on want to go first um i'll go i'll go first i mean wednesday is uh jpey and securis have been doing free prison calls so i get it like a lot of phone calls on wednesdays from people all over the country and i didn't i step into this mentorship role uh uncomfortably i mean i i know a lot of people in california who are about to get out of prison some are struggling with substance abuse or mental illness or you know anxiety and they're about to be released into a pandemic world and you know i have four years of freedom under my belt i've navigated quite a few challenges and struggles and i've leaned on a lot of people heavily for me so it's like force mentorship in the sense that i've kind of seen the path and i can offer some of that insight and just support and being there and understanding uh convert also i can think of a laundry list of mentors who are there for me on the inside and i know he has probably just many um i won't i'm not sure when i made the transition from a young dude to an old timer but at some point somebody in prison was calling me uh at your old school um and i was like what i'm a kid but um when when i was there i used to listen to and very much respect um people and like kori said earlier um it was really important for her to uh dispel some of the myths about prison and how people are towards each other on the inside and like one of the major realizations i had was the fact that the people who had the most respect were the people most likely to resolve conflict and violence in peaceful means like they they didn't have to throw fist or stab anybody they would bring the people together they would talk it out they would they would like this whole real responsible accountable and measured um wisdom that was being modeled by leaders uh who many people would dismiss as as leaders so i i think it's really cool to see wise's role to also in the place so powerfully represented for that that potent force it's not an anomaly inside um there are way more prisoners than there are guards and if it was gonna be a pure bloody violent situation it would but there are these these men who provide this mentorship role and it's really important and under under praised i think definitely um i definitely could piggyback off that for sure um i'll say you hit a lot of key points for sure i'm probably going to sound very redundant right now um ironically so a major mentor in my life like literally my first positive male role model i actually had a panel discussion earlier today and he was present like he organized the whole thing he's still currently incarcerated by the way too which is nuts um yeah they did it through the phone but i say that to say um for me the journey really began as far as like with mentorship in 2012 that's when i met samuel brown the man that i just was speaking about and he began to like just shift my thinking drastically i um again committed my crime at the age of 17 it was in prison four days after my 18th birthday so i still had a very childish mentality a very distorted belief system and it had the code of ethics of the streets strongly engraved of me at that time and he just really challenged my thinking so from there like the growth became evident and in prison for my experience for the most part at least in the beginning i always was the youngest so i really didn't have an opportunity to be a mentor or anything like that because like i always was in a odor crowd and i always was like the youngest dude um however like as i did start to grow and unfortunately more young people started to become incarcerated at a much higher rate i definitely immediately took that responsibility on because i just seen so much of myself and a bunch of the youth that was coming in and a bunch of the young life and um yeah just inadvertently did it i really didn't like put the thought into it like i'm gonna take this responsibility i'm gonna do this i mean i just did it and eventually that got me into um a mentorship program by the time i made it to san quentin i was already doing that um so it's two parts in san quentin you have eight unit where the dorms are and then you have the upper yard um with north black and west black and death row where the sales and stuff are um so when i was in age unit i was mentoring a bunch of the youth because a certain requirements there um like you have to have an age uh age eligibility as well as a time eligibility like you can't be a lifer and be down near so it's a bunch of younger people down near um and to be just quite frank like for the most part they had a young mentality and young things would happen so like i then took on like consciously the role to give mentorship in that sense which ultimately made it um to a bunch of people that was in the youth program and they reached out to me for a leadership role which i definitely took on and um yeah as far as mentorship in prison and incarceration period even still to this day like it's definitely like heavy in my life i'm definitely um influential and a bunch of other people's lives as well and it's a powerful thing with great power comes great responsibility just like uncle Peter like Peter Parker uncle said for real thank you um i want to go back to the play a little bit and talk about how the character of wise mentions to the young incarcerated men that he mentors that they have to sort of challenge the world they came up in and they also have to kind of reflect on the world that they've been exposed to and i think that that speaks to kind of the double consciousness you were talking about robbie like the system is unfair unjust and imbalanced and and yeah i find myself here um with this with with this identity and i'm wondering how he encourages the young men like glue who's a rapper to embrace the artistic pursuits to kind of both process that and um also respond to being inside um i'm wondering does this idea resonate with your work using the art to kind of both process both internal and these external influences and can can you both speak a bit about that i mean that one point i could talk about all day because like uh it's really really cuts to the core of what i think is the one of the greatest human assets is that in creative vulnerability as i like to phrase it um it's uh there's a perspective shift that happens once you go to that space in order to do that and we see in the play wise is collaboratively engaged in the creative process he's storytelling in collaboration with ernie and it's in that creative process he has to tell his story and he has and he's exploring parts of himself that wouldn't have come out otherwise there's all the defenses that exist so i mean first hand i experienced this i the first arts program i was in was a program called rehabilitation through the arts um and it's based in new york and they are and they are they do theater and acting and improv classes and writing classes a whole dance one of the first dance programs in the country was was founded by rta members um and that kind of self-expression uh opens you up to this really radical transformative space all of a sudden posturing and the young kids doing young stuff doesn't it's just not necessary anymore because you have this whole array of tools to pull from you laughter and and you know silliness to draw and you can um take off the masks uh so going from that being able to uh make work in collaboration with other people which i can't say enough like you can do you i could be the greatest artist in a bubble and it won't have the kind of impact that it will um done in collaboration with other people rubbing and conflict and and issues and trauma uh that comes from caring about something and still pushing forward um i found that to be the most transformative i feel like i've lost the thread that was very powerful in the early part of this question i'm fine before i go i also i know like e i i had an acoustic guitar in myself and every once in a while we would be able to play together right they actually let us bring the guitar to the yard and um there's something about that activity of having to make music that resonated with people and that told truth for me in a way that resonated with people over and over and over again that kind of refined the way i approach art making and then when we went and taught men in the mental health unit i could see how the art literally just popped open the the worlds uh of the the men who didn't have access to these kind of programs anyway i'll leave it at that but yeah art is radically transformative um i'd like to not in intuitive ways yes please yeah no i was going to just jump in about a program that was started at San Quentin that uh eric is involved with too which is the San Quentin mixtape which came out in in may the end of may and it's an album that was recorded in prison uh by produced and everything by a really brilliant musician named david jossy but um and it's out on all streaming platforms but it's a beautiful beautiful album uh maserati here has a song on there break the mold but um these young men told their truths in song and they weren't allowed to use cuss words or anything so they had to like resort to the dictionary to get vocabulary and find ways of expressing their truths and it's just gorgeous i mean maybe you can talk a little bit about that but i know that it really was so transformative for the lives of the men the young men who were involved in that program i mean i watched a lot of it being recorded and it was just so moving to see really absolutely um yeah definitely that's that's one thing i definitely was going to bring up for sure um for starters music in art period is just such a visceral experience it's it's hard to even like logically explain certain feelings and emotions at times and that's that's for me for myself personally it's very cathartic it's very therapeutic um and that's definitely a skill set that i've definitely like taught a bunch of people not necessarily like just making music but utilizing that as a tool utilizing that as a ventilation system if we will um to kind of express the things that we won't just openly express with just any and everybody sometimes like we can get it out to ourself through music through painting through dancing um through uh poems through poetry it's so many different forms of art and creative expression that is just so cathartic it's so therapeutic um like like you was just saying the sandquen mixtapes that definitely was a process of emotional literacy if we will i think that's ultimately what it was down to and by not having to cuss and find the um find this anonymous terms to these cuss words and things like that like that challenge alone kind of like forced everybody that participated to dig a little deeper you know what i mean which ultimately like again it became like an emotional literacy aspect now i understand what i feel why i feel it and when you understand these things you can better focus on solutions so like that's one way that art can like definitely play a role and in growth like substantially i know for myself if i didn't have music or poetry like i possibly would still be in prison i possibly would still like be in a very bad headspace for myself that was a huge part of my growth and a huge part of my journey because it allowed me to express myself without a care in the world in a sense of judgment without worrying about anything because it was just me with myself so i i would have to a hundred percent agree um with art being like a very very very productive tool of growth thank you i i kind of want to add on to that and bring in one of the questions uh from alahandro and in the q&a is that okay yes yeah so the question is like what is one the one lesson or the tips that we want audience members to leave as we continue to fight for the incarcerated and um one of the central challenges much like the wise challenge is a is a sort of paradox so uh i'm an advocate for arts programming in prisons i would also like if there were no participants to be had in arts programming in prisons uh and so talking about all this fancy beautiful you know prisoners playing classical music performing shakespeare it's great right uh but i would really really prefer if there was not a single person to perform shakespeare in prison and maybe they got it in school and maybe there was lively community theater happening you know something like that um but in with regards with what to do i think it's always been hard for me to realize what what can i do as an individual person how do you get involved um so in every state right now things are happening um where organizations are fighting to get small and large-scale changes legislative changes policy changes happening that decarcerate america we are everybody knows the stats we are the largest incarcerated per capita we have predominantly black and brown people in prison and it is it's harmful to the people involved it's harmful to victims it's harmful to communities nobody benefits anyway critical resistance dot org um is a prison abolition group check them out um i think also uh one thing we can also do is listen to the stories of people behind bars uh cori mentioned earlier uh also really powerfully that the headlines that we get about people are often horribly skewed so like if anyone reads a headline it's like always has a bias baked into how the story is told um and then reality underneath it is a much more human story so if you go to a place like the marshall project dot org or even read some of the work on penn's website uh penn dot org slash works of justice you'll see like these firsthand stories and realize that oh this person that is being locked away for one decade two decades three decades may not even be guilty and if they are guilty do they deserve to be tortured for 30 years before we release them back to society uh and is that the kind of society that we want to live in um it really it changes it when you see yourself in someone who's made a mistake um much like many of us have and don't always end up being punished to the maximum extent um but voting also is like really really important i can't say overstate the role of civic engagement and holding your uh representatives accountable um for the decisions they make about human bodies that are basically used as a funding source for rural communities with prisons like uh let's stop that yes let's stop that yeah i'd like yeah i'd like to i think what i'd like people to walk away with is aside from just the fact of understanding that these are human beings who are incarcerated and that people change that people have the capacity to change that i think is something that that is so wrong with the system um it's a punitive system so the whole point is punishment instead of rehabilitation um and so it's and it's it becomes eternal punishment so that you know all of the money that gets thrown into prisons and keeping people incarcerated could instead be put into programs because it's been proven that programming helps with rehabilitation and it prevents recidivism but then this money could be put into helping the people who are leaving prisons find affordable housing getting jobs um giving them certain certain powers that they don't have because the way the system is right now and the way the world is is when you leave prison it's set up so that it's almost impossible to go straight it's really really really hard to make it once you've have that incarcerated label and it's so easy to become incarcerated especially if you're a brown and black man or woman but you know primarily men i mean it's really a horrible horrible thing and the people and who they are um you know there's such a tiny percent who don't deserve to be walking the streets and even those people there's something there's mental illness and those people don't deserve to be punished for being ill either you know so i think it's just that the whole idea of punishment is what's wrong with the system if it was about educating i mean there are people who have done very wrong things and deserve to be maybe you know take some time to understand what was wrong and to learn and to grow but not punished that doesn't do anything that doesn't help anyone so that's my thing definitely i think another takeaway um at least a takeaway that i would like for people to have as well um as far as like when giving proper resources and things like that the potential that we have kind of like the piggyback what you were saying Cory um when people are i guess you could say successful and do overcome those eyes like a lot of people make it seems as if like that person was exceptional or something like like if there were anomaly or something like that when in actuality we're looking at the reflection of what would happen if people were given the proper resources if people were given that fair chance if we will and i i just hope that people watch this and are able to grasp that and see that prime example like wise how he was like literally teaching his class this that and the other giving people the tool set in order to like find solutions to certain problems whether that be within self or just perspective of the things around him which still was down itself um like the success rate is tremendously increased which ultimately like when people do grasp these things and do these things like again like they're not the exception they're not necessarily exceptional this is just what happens and it can it can continue to happen on a more regular basis if we see this more regularly if we are given that fair chance if we are given proper resources if we are given proper treatment which is something that we don't necessarily see in incarceration system in america um as far as like with mental health and a whole bunch of the things that we don't see proper treatment on but like ultimately i think we'll see massive changes and hopefully like that's a takeaway for other people to see as well because we all play this role in society like at the end of the day like if we just sitting back and watching necessarily part of the solution like technically you're part of the problem at that point too and i think that was down as well to a perspective type of thing but we can't combat what we don't know exists you know what i mean so like hopefully these are the type of things that can teach people these tool sets are just a different perspective just shift the perspective just that much more to now see something else to look at for to like identify these type of things you know it seems also so much the play quarry is this co-creation that you have it's a message in the bottle too um in a way that is reading about your filmmaking eric also seems like the details the storytelling um that's what gets through it's like the full story's got to get through uh in addition to the steps that you've already outlined are there other steps that you hope sort of beyond empathy beyond dialogue that you wish that community members and activists um would do or how people might engage absolutely i think there's multiple um actions that could be taken from various communities and that's again just giving people a chance like for the most part um people coming out of prison really don't have too much to come home to so like the main necessities i would say is occupation and housing um as well as transportation like you got people um and i'm just going to throw a random out a random number out here but just from my own personal experience i would say about 75% of the people that i encountered was coming home to nothing so that's one of the things that kind of forced their hands if we will to like this distorted belief system as nothing's going to change i have to make a way and i have to continue um in the life of the streets if we will because like you we don't get any assistance for the most part adequate assistance should i say because they are there are transitional housing and things of that nature that the state provides but if you pay attention to the location that these transitional houses are in they're literally like right in the midst of the hood like like smack dab in the center of like where it's a bunch of prostitution it's a bunch of drugs the crime rate is extremely high how can you expect the person to like properly transition their mind of thinking that they're still completely inundated in the midst of the very thing that they're trying to combat like it's going to be that much more arduous to obtain that so i feel like if we were given like more opportunities for better occupation more opportunities for better housing more opportunities for better transportation where we can actually get the tool set to sustain that on our own then the the chances the likelihood of seeing a better neighbor of seeing that actual sense of rehabilitation will be much more higher thank you but kori there's a question for you what you've learned while developing lockdown over this period of time and how is it hearing the piece again today it hearing the piece made me want to see it again you know seeing seeing it performed was a really powerful experience for me it was really interesting because when daniella topol the artistic director at rattlesnake wanted to have conversations after every performance i was like every performance and she said every performance even opening night there was a conversation and but they weren't like your regular talk back i mean i think i participated in two all together so they were conversations between people who had some sort of lived experience whether working or having been incarcerated and and the the conversations were about themes that the play brought up so that there were action points and things and and but it was a it was really interesting the air conditioning was broke a lot of the time in that theater so it was hot and people stayed so people wanted to get engaged people wanted to talk and to learn and i saw some of the most miraculous things happening after the play after people had seen the play the most remarkable things happened during the conversation i think i mean i'll just share one story that was to me one of the most amazing things and i actually didn't even find out till afterwards there was a there was one performance that was a bunch of policemen in the audience which i remember walking in in seeing these cops with their guns on their hips and i was like oh boy and then there was a bunch of um it was like a school audience or youth who were there and i was just like i'm going to be stoned at the end of this thing or whatever because people don't know but the character wise is imprisoned because he killed a cop in the course of a robbery when he was uh 16 so i was sure that these police were going to be up in arms at the end of this play and it was there was the most amazing conversation that conversation was the chief of police and a young uh young man who had been involved somewhat in the system a little bit he was already in the system and they had a really amazing conversation you know the young man challenge this guy you guys are out there shooting us and killing us and you get away with it and then the cop was also talking in a way that i've never heard or that i hadn't expected because he was talking about how hard it is sometimes to be a cop too and how hard it is to do what you have to do and whatever so it was like a very human amazing conversation that they had but what happened is that some months later this young man who had been uh talking to the cop his best friend was shot and killed in the streets and he went to react as he normally did which is go find a gun and go retaliate and instead he remembered the play and he said i don't want to spend 46 years in prison and so instead he that called that chief of police and spoke to him and so i just when i heard this story you know later i was just so moved and touched by that and you know that somehow a play i mean i didn't write the play with an agenda i wanted to honor people i've met and come to care about and share that because i felt ashamed that i didn't realize that these were the kinds of people who were incarcerated and i wanted people to understand the caliber of people that are incarcerated in this country but i didn't understand that a play can actually do something you know so that was very and it wasn't the only thing but that's one of the dramatic things but there were a few other things like that that happened and so i was just really very very moved by that it was moving to see the play at the prison too with all and we sat there the first the vcr wasn't working or the dvd player so we had to sit around brian's computer we had our screening it was really moving to see it with and there were some people there who said they'd never seen a play before you know and so they didn't know what to expect but everyone had sort of contributed or participated so that was a very moving experience for me also anyway thank you that's powerful how was it for you eric seeing the play uh it was definitely moving for me as well because um like majority of the people within it like i knew i knew who was playing a who like and even the ones that we didn't like we kind of had to figure it out like whoop was that whoop like it was okay it was a part on there too it was remember we always tripping out about like trying to figure out what the um what the um what the geese represented we like did it represent that like it ultimately though overall it definitely was a very very moving experience for sure i feel like it was definitely a eye-opening experience and it was a great way to start a conversation that most people aren't necessarily thinking even needs to be had um i feel like if you want to look at the reflection of any type of society a prison would definitely be a reflection of that society because you're gonna have a bunch of literally everybody from the good and the bad because what we have to be honest can't be biased it is people that aren't necessarily good um however like those are the people that you will find in prison as well so like i think it's an excellent tool that can be utilized for sure um and then vice versa for the people that for the actors that have to play that um one thing about acting like it's an excellent tool to gain empathy you have to literally put yourself in someone else's shoes so i'm pretty sure they were impacted in a way like especially that set the set was so spot on like that's one thing i definitely have to give credit for oh my goodness when we seen the way the cell looked and all that was like man it was nuts especially with us like living there i was so particular right and i was so particular because you know the cells are tiny those sanguine cells are tiny six by eight isn't it right isn't six by eight eight six by eight and a half so literally there's a bunk bed with two men and like you can i mean you can't even do this from the edge of the bed to the wall that's how narrow the little right you can little have your forearm against one wall and have your full hand pressed against the other like no like that this is the size so i when they first did the cell i was like that is too big i'm sorry so i made him change it so that it was the exact i was like it has to be the same dimension i was so particular i had pictures like the the i wanted the uniforms to be right everything everything everything i just wanted every detail to be ended and i have to say the designers the actors the director everyone just put their heart and soul into these details because i was so like i really just wanted to actually reflect you know the truth as i know it to you know that was the only way i could think of really honoring the whole situation um someone put in the in the questions uh so i'll try to answer that um how hard was it to put down the words um i mean you know i spent a lot of time there so i was there working i mean i'd be there sometimes eight hours a day in the beginning because i was working with a program so i just was absorbing my environment um you know um erlon who's the host of of the of ear hustle in the very beginning i mean in the beginning days i'd have my little notebook so i was just capturing like people would be talking to each other and i'd say can you please repeat what you just said to him because i wanted to get the syntax and the slang and he was like i'm going to give you vocabulary lessons so he did he would teach me one word a day and at the end of the week i had a quiz and um so that's how i just started and he's like you're pretty good one of these days you're going to be out there and somebody's going to ask you how long you've been out that's what he said to me but anyway um and even during rehearsal i'd be like texting erlon because by then he had been released like what would you say like what's the best way to say this so i mean i came up with the dialogue but i i would also run it by lani lani read every draft lani i who did was the did prison turkey as i called it because he the first draft of that play it was all x'd question mark what is this this is corny this is he stupid or is he smarter like he was just so particular about every little thing this is not the way it happens um i remember jb telling me exactly what happens uh you know when you're sent to the whole exactly step by step and you remember the rap i wrote a rap she's a rapper there's a rapper in the in the thing and so and david i had written the thing and given it to david jase to read and he's like this looks like an og from the 80s wrote it and i'm like well i'm not a rapper so i was thinking maybe he would offer to you know like i'll just write something no he's like you can do it yourself and i'm like what so he gave me the list of a bunch of people that he said this is what the youngsters listen to so i had to go now and listen to these things so i listened and so what i did was i just copied the rhythm but i put my own words to the rhythm by now i knew the slang and all this stuff so when i came in david's whole block was on lockdown so you know some quarantine lockdown so i'm like now i can't show him my draft because there's no way to get information i have to physically the day i come in there with a handwritten piece of paper or whatever to show it so i came there eric was and i said can you read this please and let me know what you think so he read this and i'm like i mean i know it's not good that it's from a play it's like you could be a ghost i couldn't believe it it was like this to be like all the way it looks somebody in the chat put mc quarry that is mc quarry for show like it was actually like good like it wasn't just okay it was good i'm like you wrote like you wrote this just like yeah i got to pass it around to other people like bro look like she wrote this like this is nuts but like it she could be a ghost rider i'm so here she could be a ghost rider like i'm like whoa woulda not that's awesome this is you know we're talking about the power of the power of words i want robbie i'd love to hear a bit about your path as an an artist and the work that you do with pin america's prison writing program sure that's a weird non sequitur from from quarry's uh oh it's the power of the words okay okay i'll jack it i'll jack it we're doing rapping career and we worship writers here at the o'neill gotcha gotcha gotcha um i'm trying very hard to get a category we uh we celebrate an award uh fiction non-fiction poetry and drama and it would be really cool if we had a songwriting category there's a lot of rappers in prison amazing amazing fire as they as as the youth them would say um but um so i mean every year we get thousands of entries and it's funny that uh this mentorship comes up we have a team of people who volunteer as mentors and we assign all the winners a mentor and people who get honorable mention and also people who we identify that their work has like some kind of spark or merit out of those thousand or thousand plus entries we get every year and this year um we've tried to assign even more in the pandemic understanding that most uh prison programs had been shut down for months and that people had literally no access to much of anything outside of their cells even yard and rec was run differently inside prison so having people to write to and share your work but i've seen in the two years that i've been managing the mentorship program i've seen remarkable unbelievable transformational things that happen following the same model of uh wise and and and Ernie from Corey's play and i think volunteers often talk about how much it's changed their life and their perspective um and the people inside are always like no no no i get so much more and the volunteers like no i get so much more um but when like very often the stories are poignant personal we've had stories about people's crimes in some cases we've had stories about tender childhood memories that you know give insight into like the the first trauma that a person has experienced both for men and for women and then you start to see these these stories and that's a really tender thing to share with someone and receive critique on so much like i'm sure your rap it was a tender thing to rap and get feedback on your rap um that that process uh being able to witness it happen over and over again between people from radically different backgrounds with radically different experiences i think it provides uh much like wise says that the end of the scene that we said there is so much hope you wouldn't believe i literally i i see it every day uh this hope of people bridging across race and age and and and difference in you know silver spoon to the worst ghetto and hood like they we all connect over this core thing that is human uh the need to be appreciated recognized and loved um and uh it's it's miraculous and pen is i'm proud to work at pen who celebrates this action we're coming out with an anthology of this year's winning work uh soon i'm putting it together myself slaving away in the basement i'm in the attic right now that i go to the basement to do the anthology and we'll have more info if you go to uh pen pen.org slash works of justice it's all in the thing uh you can subscribe to our newsletter and we'll we'll send that but that's got incredible work this year we also included um letters from people all over the country about the pandemic experience so that'll be included in the anthology um and it's some of it is really tremendously poignant stories about people being woken up by someone coming to their cell and telling them they tested positive for covid or that a loved one has died or that they're going to solitary confinement because they've uh tested positive that it's the disaster that is covid in prisons is still unfolding uh and it's that mixed feeling you have a presenting this work in a book and celebrating it alongside great work um but it's a little bit sobering uh to witness as well but it's important to witness um much like lockdown does it's sobering to see humans placed in tiny cages that you can reach like this um but it's important to witness it um with with all that in mind and i'm grateful to all of you for coming today and checking it out all the audience members thank you yeah thank you everyone we will be sure that those that resource that people are looking for that pen anthology um and i think the last question for tonight mazarati will go to you as we heard your music coming in and the music is gonna take us out later and i would just love to hear a bit about uh about about your music career and the work that you do um but just to our audience too we're gonna make sure you have links and website and resources uh beyond this conversation tonight um definitely so it's a couple of things going on musically right now um like cori said earlier you could definitely check out the sandquinn mix tapes on all streaming platforms right now um it got a bunch of celebrity endorsements which is definitely cool uh track one you'll be able to feature uh you'll be able to check that out it's a whole bunch of that going on um another thing um like recently not recently shortly excuse me after my release um i was actually made an executive producer of a mainstream album um with the represent justice campaign and what we'll be doing is partnering um like a list of celebrities in the music game no exaggeration such as like jcoe common um d smoke um to my knowledge elicia keys actually just confirmed for this project not too long ago and we'll be partnering them with directly impacted individuals such as the formerly and currently incarcerated and um we'll literally be going back into the prisons and practically doing like a talent search and um from there we'll be partnering the people that we've decided to choose with the ones um like i said like jcoe common d smoke so it's going to be a pretty powerful project i think it'll definitely alter like perceptional value for the directly impacted people that come from directly impacted communities and system impacted communities and things of that nature um another thing i got a a e-p for the drop sooner than later it'll be titled resilience be able to look out for that um another one called i always mess up on this word why do we name it this in in imitable which means it is difficult to imitate what um what my brother who also is featured in um the netflix documentary cuba what a a documentary that's featured on netflix um cuba my brother cutting continental cutting we got another e-p coming out uh very soon as well and um yeah definitely still doing a bunch of gigs uh everything is transitioning to zoom now um i performed at a couple protests and stuff like that that's been out here but definitely still open for gigs and stuff like that as well so like the music is doing pretty good you know cutting yeah that's my brother literally that's my brother oh amazing definitely i'll let him know right just say what's up please um i want to thank you i want to thank all of our panelists and the artists who came today um if there are outstanding questions from the audience we might write to you for some answers we're also gonna make sure that they've got your websites and all of that and we will be checking in representative justice sounds amazing um thank you cori thank you robby thank you eric and i'd love to welcome back patrice steen mclean to tell us a bit more about how this series is functions in the o'neill's larger anti-racist plan thank you everybody hello oh my god that panel was amazing it was amazing and i think it's so um it's just so indicative what i think this event was intended to do um art is so powerful and transformative and i feel like rachel the discussion definitely was it was just an example of of the magic of of what we do um i do want to talk a little bit about the anti-racism plan the action plan that is going to be taking place throughout this the remainder of this year to give you guys a little bit of context a post the murder of george floyd we all know there's been a universal call to action um to address injustice and racism and all areas of american life and the american theater is no different uh the o'neill is currently going through the inventory process to fully understand how they have been either a part of or silently complicit in perpetuating racist practices and after this thorough and very vulnerable expo exploration the institution along with representatives from important stakeholders will start the process of implementing a series of programming to address the shortcomings and the blind spots that we may discover uh the the o'neill has committed to giving this work a significant amount of energy to to go through this entire process throughout the remainder of the year and i think we all are going to look forward to or we'll be looking forward to sharing the full vision upon completion the place to progress series is the most immediate implementation but this is just one of the many ongoing and continual phases to recognize and support black indigenous artists artists of color and to support the black artists um the black lives matter movement black artists matter too okay uh i i want to um just close with something that robby said that was so impactful he talked about how his process as an individual um while being incarcerated is it required a large amount of vulnerability um he couldn't do it in a silo he had to do it in community with someone else and it required a lot of uncomfortable moments and moving through the discomfort is what helps to get you through the other side and that was just one i had to write it down because i think that is a great uh parallel and it really wraps up what uh the work that i've been doing with the o'neill um and the work that they've committed to doing it will not be done in a silo racism and injustice wasn't created in a bubble so we can't solve it in a bubble um and so thank you all for being a part of the process coming and making sure checking out the last series and now this series and we look forward to sharing much more as we do an official rollout later in the year that's right thank you so much patrice we encourage all of you at home to familiarize yourself with the details of we see you white american theater as well as the o'neill's anti-racist action plan and please be in conversation with us beyond this moment and join us october 14th for our next place to progress chat you can find all of that information at our website www.theoneal.org with extreme gratitude to all of you that joined us and the artists and panelists tonight all those artists everyone was an artist on the panel tonight um thank you and have a restful and reflective evening like butane when you in the same conclusion just a different person