Young Actors Workshop: Mama's Chicken

In the year 1991, I joined up with a group called The Young Actors Workshop in San Pablo, California. It was a gaggle of kids age 8-18, and we would be performing monkeys for the adults to enjoy. In some cases, some of us were literally performing monkeys. It was humiliation like none other.

I have many happy memories there, but I also have memories that I wish I could forget. Alas....I can't. So instead, I shall write about them from time to time. This is one of those times.

In the first summer of my time at YAW, (the acronym for it), a woman named June was in charge. She had this idea to do a sketch comedy show around Dracula. It had all the appeal of seeing Whoopi Goldberg naked to us kids. So instead we went with Heroes vs Villains in a show called Heroes Of The Future Right Now.

Catchy, eh?

The show did have a couple of Dracula carry over that was fun, but that needed to die badly in a blaze of glory was called ‘Mama’s Chicken’. It was offensive as fuck. It may have seemed innocent...but oh no it was not. Not at all.

 OK, so here goes the fresh that was this idea that should have never left the head of the one who thought it up: a woman and a child, (no clue if it is mother and child or nanny with ward or Alabama school teacher with student lover), are having a picnic. In the night. Because you know, everyone takes their child/ward/love slave on moon lit picnics. Suddenly, Dracula appears. Shock and horror then appears on the faces of all that has all the force of a fart coming out of a prolapsed rectum.

Nice visual, huh? Let that simmer in your head for a moment.

OK, moving on.

So, Dracula appears and is threatening to suck the blood of these two until the child offers Dracula a piece of fried chicken. He takes a bite, enjoys it so much, and proceeds to eat it all while the humans flee the scene. The worst part? The child cast as Dracula was African-American.

I wish I was exaggerating this part for entertainment reasons, but this is completely true. However, it gets worse. How, you ask? The original version was a lot more different. And racist.

So, the version of ‘Mama's Chicken’ you just read above was all done as a pantomime (acting with no dialogue for you non theater people). Originally, this scene not only had dialogue, but a song. A fucking song. A song sung by the woman, the child, and Blacula about how Mama’s Chicken tastes good because it is fried in Crisco. Dear God, I wish this was fiction, but it seriously happened.

June thought it was a great idea until she was told it was racist to have a black child singing about the joys of Fried Chicken cooked in Crisco. It didn't help that I mentioned to a apprentice director that I was waiting for the dancing watermelon slices to do a soft shoe sand dance while a sign comes down saying that they were in Jigaboo Junction. 

Yes, I actually said this to then Apprentice/assistant director Susan. She was none to happy with the way I put it, but the point came across, and she talked June out of it. I think this is where my reputation of being a naughty influence at YAW began as well. 

True story.