Interview with Penwah

ACTOR INTERVIEW: “There is enough for everyone” Penwah

I am Penwah. Well quiet as its kept, I just recently found out I was first on stage as the baby Jesus in a Black Nativity. I was born in June, I understand rehearsals began that year the following week of Thanksgiving I understand I was like 5 months old. My first memory of acting, was at four and a half years old. I was the featured Sugar Plum Fairy in a production of The Nutcracker. My mother knew exactly what to do with me. There after I was in a production of Babes and Toyland. But of course each Spring Recitals, Performance Arts Summer Camps, my mom was all about legitimate Theatre.

Did you study acting?
Absolutely, for as long as I can remember. I originally studied at the world famous ‘Elma Lewis School of Fine Arts, Boston. Miss Lewis and my mother were dear friends, Between the two of them they discovered I was gifted, I began point at about age seven. The training was thorough music classes the Prima Ballerina classes In those days the acting classes were run by The Blackwell Brothers; Mr.Vernon Blackwell in particular crowned me as his favorite! He kept me with him as much as possible we laughed I learned That man put me in every production they put out! He use to go up against my mother and that scorpio was no joke! Later when I became a prodigy I got to study with all kinds of various techniques with all kinds of White Folk, It was different & interesting but I did it graciously, it made my mother really happy. Some of the names fail to serve me right now at this given moment. I got scholarships to go and study a lot of places, for the gifted and talented etc etc. I was a featured high soprano vocalist for The Boston Symphony Orchestra presents. A Christmas Carol with Arthur Fiedler The only reason I remember it my mother bragged about it until the day she died. Lol bless her heart That’s where my classical training came in handy!

What acting technique do you use?
This is a HARD question, I have studied vigorously with the some of the GREATS Like Jeannie Quarles Tibbs, Lillian Goldbolt (Jimmy Slides) Mom Ruth “SIS” Johnson who is the Ann /Frank Silvera connection. C Bernard Jackson, Beah Richards, Glynn Turman, Mae Evelyn Diggs, George C Wolfe,Dr.Barbra Ann Teer Adolph Caesar A LOT is just good old fashioned Method, Miesner, Strasberg, Adler and consistent rehearsal. Whatever these people here I named were TEACHING? I was absorbing it up like a sponge! Thats REAL name dropping in my neck of the woods! AND I ALSO studied dance and acting with Fred BenjaminToo! I was about 10-12yrs old!

Describe wrong impressions actors hold about acting
One thing I do know, it is not a game. It is not a play time.

Do you take courses to improve your craft?
Constantly and Consistently. All the time. I love Tony Abeson. Barbra Montgomery has a great deal to share. At a thousand years old, I take a class anywhere I can! You have got to keep your chops well oiled. I think TSAW is extraordinary for any actor. Tasha Smith teaches the Ivanna Chubbuck technique. I am still learning and loving every moment of it!. Tracy Moore The spirited actor, is a national treasure at her tender young age! Her classes are worth her weight in gold.

What acting books do you read?
‘Truth’ by the great Ruth Batson’s Kid! Susan Batson ~ AUDITION Michael Shurtleff ~ THE SPIRITED ACTOR TRACY MOORE ~ There are so many I cant remember?? Shakespeare August Wilson All the old classics tho…..The perfect monologue Friedman~ Monologues for Women~STAGES Talia Pura.

How do you keep fit as an actor: mentally, physically?
Prayer, Breathing techniques Vocal Exercises Warm up’s.

When you are offered a role, what do you do next?
CRY….PRAY…. PRAISE GOD…. AND HIS MERCY THANK HIM….And all the ancestors, that paves the way to this very moment. EVEN IF ITS ONE LINE!!!!! I HAVE THE SAME REACTION!!! Turn off my phones, & don’t tell a living soul, meditate, study to background development on the character learn everything I can about the director the play write etc…read EVERYTHING read the script over and over again every time I discover something I didn’t before

How do you take a character in a script to an honest, believable and breathing person?
I am a PEOPLE watcher, a people listener, I go in, I have so much passion for what I do, .. do your homework. Do your research. Back In the olden days, l use to spend hours at Lincoln Center Library reading and watching microfilm or any library available, study, study, study, practice. See every play study your favorite actors. These days the world is at you fingertips, I mean I use to hitchhike to get to auditions! There is no excuse, no reason to fail, The information is at your fingertips!

How do you stay fresh on a production set?
Number one I refuse to let anyone call me anything but the characters name, repetition, do as she does, eat what she would eat, stuff like that!

Explain one creative choice you took on set?
Living in the moment keeping it honest. You gotta “Use It”. Years ago, I ran away to Los Angeles to become a famous movie actress! I did a movie called Sunny Side. It was a gang related film, I think the lead guy was Joey Travolta and I was playing the girlfriend of the gang leader E Lamont Johnson? Or was is Kevin Hooks? My, was it that long ago? Any way I got called in because somebody knew somebody, that saw me in a play at Inner City.

But BABY it’s cold outside pic.twitter.com/WLwLBLK89N

— THEREALPENWAH (@PenwahPhynjuar) October 21, 2014

So of course I was pretending like I had actually been on a set before. We rehearsed the scene 3-4 times, My boyfriend was slain there before my eyes, I was brilliant, every reaction was authentic believable, down to the tears for the Charles river honey! Of course I am a girl from “the neighborhood” I had seen more funerals, stabbings bodies than weddings. But they had this guy that kept repeating himself to me about the guns, explained the blood packets, I watched them tape them on, yadda yadda yadda…….ya ya ya I’m still being all cute and charming and all don’t you worry I got this….ya ya ya so finally I hear someone say we got speed?

Sound? The director said Action, I went a walking with my boyfriend did everything exactly as rehearsed the bad guys came but This time the guns actually went off, there was smoke, the cute guys T-Shirt exploded gun holes and blood oozed, my scream , my surprise. They scared the living crap out of me! Those guns where so loud, I almost peed! The director said oh my God, you were holding back on me, that was exquisite! One take Penwah, that’s where that nickname came from. That’s the day I learned to give it ‘All Right Up’ front like you don’t get a second chance. People started calling me in because they didn’t have all day. They want the job done call in a professional and that was me! I still can’t believe the time wasted and money spent on incompetence and mediocrity. Oh well. We all have choices!

Describe a memorable character you played?
Ah, Miss Lamamma shaking the mess out of misery. Oh! I Forgot! Coloured Girls on Times Square!

The three strongest sections are the group’s recitation of all the men’s apologies they’ve ever heard; a riff on being the last virgin in the class on graduation night by the Lady in Yellow (Penwah, who has considerable stage presence); and a horror story, from the Lady in Red (Shelita Birchett), about her children’s deranged father putting them in danger by — here’s relevance for you — dangling them out a window.

With a play like this, the collection of stories would be nothing if not for the flawless actresses sent to inhabit the women of Daughter’s memory. Here, each woman lights up the stage with their exceptionally eccentric characterizations, making it simple to understand why Daughter is so proud to have been loved by each Mama. As the matron most directly in charge of raising Daughter, the original Big Mama is played with gentle compassion by Johnnie Mae, an imposing woman devoted to her Bible and capable of using it to keep Daughter in line. Kimberly “Q” gives Aunt Mae her requisite hip-swaggering confidence as the independent woman too busy for a husband, and Phynjuar delights in Miss Lamama’s outlandish tribal devotions and dynamic confrontational skills.

What do you want most from a director?

Explicit direction. Trust. Freedom to understand exactly the who of whom he hired. I want him to guide me and let me do my thing.

What actor do you long to work with?
Oh! Now your looking for trouble! You have that kind of time? There are PLENTY I am afraid I may leave someone out!

What advice would you give actors around the world?
Be nice, and respectful to each other. You never know what kind of struggle people are experiencing. No one is there to take anything away from you! There is enough for everyone, I believe God has laid out your whole story before we get here! Whats yours will you will have, whats theirs they will have. All this hateration and animosity toward your fellow creatives is seriously bad news! Please remember my Beloved’s

Karma is only a bitch if you are,. that’s a Penwahizium. Study, be prepared, for you will be called upon. It is not who you know, it is who knows you.

Briefly write about your career
This is so hard. I am a thousand years old. My career has spanned films like ‘Hair’, Colored Girls’, ‘Piano Bar’, ‘Tribes’, ‘Shaking the mess out of misery’, ‘Power Play Testity’, ‘Summer Suns Tales of Night’, ‘Deadwood Dick Legend of the West’, ‘Crenshaw Boulevard’, ‘Seasons Reasons’, ‘Sirens’.