Breaking
Through the Cultural Apartheid
by
Jay Blotcher
“When
you have low esteem, you want to be someone else,” he said,
“so acting and drama just fit in with that.”
After
several high school productions, Monasterial graduated but kept
his love of theater alive through college, resulting in the creation
of his own acting company. Three Brothers Theater was established
in 1984, while Monasterial also did daywork as a cameraman at the
United Nations. He wrote several scripts and received local grants
to stage them over the next seven years at local high schools and
colleges. Often, the troupe only received stipends to cover gas
money.
Monasterial
pledged that his work would focus on upbeat messages. “I wanted
plays with social significance,” he said. “Themes of
independence, self-sufficiency and pride.” Monasterial, who
is of mixed race [black, white and Puerto Rican] not only faced
family problems at home, but admits that his life went off the rails
at one point. While he declines to provide details, the misstep
apparently involved either gang time or jail time or both, because
Recidivism carries the bitter tang of prison talk and depicts the
mounting passions that occur when testosterone behind bars clashes.
“All
the material in this play is accurate,” he said, “down
to the uniforms, language, lifestyle.”
Monasterial
wrote Recidivism six years ago and first staged it for the members
of a drug treatment program in the Westchester town of Valhalla.
The audience, composed of former inmates, praised the integrity
of the piece, telling the cast and playwright, “This is our
story.”
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