All parents want the best for their kids. In the world premiere of “From 145th to 98th Street” at Sarasota’s Urbanite Theatre, playwright Nia Akilah Robinson examines this common desire in the context of the Black experience.
Urbanite Artistic Director Summer Wallace provides this synopsis.
“Jackie and Cedric are the parents and they have moved their family, their two children, Jamal and Fatima, from the heart of Harlem, from 145th, to 98th Street … so they could get the kids in better schools, have more potential after-school programs, things of that nature with an eye toward college opportunities and so forth.”
Best laid plans often go awry.
In a case of mistaken identity, Jamal is wrongfully accused of a crime when a local news station grabs his picture from Facebook instead of the actual perpetrator. At the same time, Fatima announces that she’s rethinking the whole going-to-college plan.
“Audiences will find themselves in this family,” said Wallace. “You walk away from the play thinking, wow, I’ve had that conversation with my son a thousand times but I never actually explained why I think that way or why I feel that way, and sometimes as family, we love each other but … we talk at each other but we don’t necessarily talk to each other, if that makes sense.”
While themes like these may be universal, they may play out differently in households of color.
“This play, to me, it’s really about community and showcasing how as a community, we’re very different from each other and have different experiences because of our economic backgrounds or where we live or because of our race,” Wallace added. “But also how many similarities we also have.”
“From 145th to 98th Street” is onstage at Urbanite Theatre through June 29th. Don’t wait to make your reservations. The theater seats only 65 people per performance.
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Urbanite Theatre commissioned “From 145th to 98th Street” in 2020 during the pandemic in an effort to nurture artists and their work during the shutdown.
“It was part of our Charles Rowan Beye New Commission Series,” said Artistic Director Summer Wallace. Urbanite dedicated the commission series to Beye following his death in 2020. Described as “the earliest, most impactful and devoted Urbanite supporter,” Beye “adored new work, provocative themes and challenging humor,” especially productions that illuminated important social and cultural themes.
“We asked playwrights to submit a sample of their writing and to pitch an idea for play,” said Wallace. “So Nia [Akilah Robinson] obviously became a finalist and we commissioned her play.”
It was one of four that Urbanite commissioned as a consequence of the series.
“She had sent a writing sample of a play called ‘WP Means White People’ that kind of gave an example of her style of writing. It was a great play.”
Robinson’s first pitch was about mistaken identity, but later morphed into the play’s current structure.
“It was just a three-paragraph idea, essentially, so we commissioned the play and it has evolved to what it is today over the five year span," Wallace said.
To put the play into geographical context, 145th Street is in the heart of Harlem. By contrast, 98th Street is the uppermost boundary of the Carnegie Hill Historic District, which extends along the east side down to 86th Street and from Fifth Avenue east to Lexington. The name dates from the first years of the 20th century, after Andrew Carnegie constructed his mansion on Fifth Avenue and 91st Street. Carnegie purchased land in what was then referred to as Prospect Hill, a section already well-developed with row houses and a few modest apartment houses and tenements.
The area has a distinctive topography, situated on a hill that creates a unique sense of place. The historic district includes rows of brick and brownstone townhouses built between the 1870s and 1890s, large freestanding townhouses, flats, mansions and apartment buildings from the 1900s through the 1930s, and larger apartment buildings from the years following World War I to the Great Depression.
The district encompasses Frank Lloyd Wright’s Guggenheim Museum and is close to the Metropolitan Museum of Art as well.
Robinson is from Harlem and represents Harlem both personally and professionally. She has been a MacDowell Fellow, Travis Bogard Eugene O'Neill Foundation Fellow, and a writer for PEN America and EST/Alfred P. Sloan Foundation (short play). She has also had residencies at NYSAF and The Pocantico Center through YoungArts.
Robinson’s work was featured in the 2024 46th Bay Area Playwrights Festival, 2024 The Fire This Time Festival, the 2023 SPACE JAM @ Roundabout Theatre, and the 48th Samuel French Off-Off-Broadway Short Play Festival. She participated in the National Black Theatre Soul Series and received the 2023 Film & TV Mentorship by Mitzi Miller. She has been awarded 1st Place for the 2023 A is For Playwriting Contest, the Next Wave Initiative Lorraine Hansberry Writing Scholarship, a Miranda Family Fund Commission, and the NYSCA Grant (CCCADI). She was shortlisted for the 2023 Theatre503’s International Playwriting Award.
She's had productions at Soho Rep U.S. Off Broadway Premiere (2025 New York Times Critics Pick- Extended Twice!), Theatre503 (London), and The Hearth. Her work has been seen and developed with Steppenwolf Theatre, The Hearth, The New Group, Theatre503 (UK), The Ground Floor: Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Great Plains Theatre Conference, SPACE on Ryder Farm, Ensemble Studio Theatre, Waterwell, and Classical Theatre of Harlem.
“The playwright is BIPOC, the director is BIPOC and the play features an all-Black cast,” Wallace noted. “We have two actors from New York, one actor from Chicago. We have a local actress in the play and a recent graduate from the FSU Opera Conservatory. So it’s a very talented group of humans all coming together,” Wallace said.
Imani Slates is Jackie; Brian Darnell Coats is Cedric; Sol Fuller plays the part of Fatima; Ibukun Omotowa is Jamal; and Ariel Blue appears in the role of Dawn. Coats is a member of the Actors Equity Association.
Jerrica D. White directs.
“'From 145th to 98th Street' does give a slice of what the Black experience is. The news station just pulls a picture of Jamal from his Facebook because Curtly is a very common last name. They don’t do their due diligence. There’s a moment in the play of Black on Black violence where they get a noise complaint by their neighbor, who’s also Black. So it does examine the Black experience, but at the same time there’s universal themes. All parents want the best for their kids.”
While parents may want the best for their kids, they don’t always explain what they envision that to be – or why.
“They set a lot of rules, but we don’t talk about the rules and why as parents we’re making these decisions,” Wallace observed. “I know for myself, my mom said you’re going to college. It didn’t matter where I was going to go, but I was going to go. I remember having that conversation with my mom. You’re going to college, and there’s a similar conversation in the play.”
Nor do the Curtlys share their own dreams and plans with their children.
“Once the kids are out of the house, they’re going to move back to New Jersey and get a small one-bedroom. She’s going to be able to garden and then we learn Fatima is doubting her college plans. So the play is kind of a slice of life play about what is happening to this family in real time.”
Wallace also wants audiences to know just how awesome the set is for “From 145th to 98th Street.”
“We’ve basically turned the theater into an apartment. It’s like being in the Curtlys' living room, watching the family interact with one another,” Wallace said. “One of the things our audiences love the most is opening the door to see how we’ve configured the space and what we’ve turned it into. So the audience, we are literally in the home of the Curtly family, if that makes sense.”
Support for WGCU’s arts & culture reporting comes from the Estate of Myra Janco Daniels, the Charles M. and Joan R. Taylor Foundation, and Naomi Bloom in loving memory of her husband, Ron Wallace.
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