Review: Big Issues, Tiny Set in Amina Henry's "Rent Party"
Rent Party Written by Amina Henry Directed by Gretchen Van Lente Presented by Drama of Works at The Tank 316 W. 36th St., Manhattan, NYC July 12-21, 2019 Ashley Winkfield and Christian Roberson. Photo credit: Kacey Anisa Stamats. “Ain’t no party without darkness and song.” –The Cat People associate New York with many things. High rents top anyone’s list. Exorbitantly high rents in the city are a relatively new thing, though. One could find an apartment in many neighborhoods for just a few hundred, or even double digits , a month for most of the twentieth century. However, tenants’ relationships with landlords have always been sticky in the city—especially in Harlem. African Americans have faced more challenges regarding rent in NYC given that they were allowed (socially and for a time legally) to live only in a few areas of the city, and landlords took advantage of that. Enter the rent party . The burst of artistic activity in Harlem in the 1920s including poetry, ...