“The Mountaintop” playwright Katori Hall will be the next artistic director of the Hattiloo Theater, the New York Times reports. Located in Hall’s hometown, Memphis, the Hattiloo is an African-American repertory theater that was founded in 2006.
Speaking to the Memphis paper The Commercial Appeal, Hall commented that she plans to spark “a renaissance, a revitalization of the arts in Memphis” in her new position. Hattiloo founder Ekundayo Bandele added that Hall’s hiring is a “dream come true.”
Bandele is confident that Hall’s role as artistic director will bring the Hattiloo into the national cultural conversation. “Hattiloo is making a shift to be a main, if not the main player in black theater in the country,” he said.
Hall won an Olivier Award for “The Mountaintop,” which follows Martin Luther King Jr. on the night before his assassination in Memphis. Samuel L. Jackson and Angela Bassett starred in the Broadway production, which opened in 2011.
“The Blood Quilt,” one of Hall’s recent plays, featured an all-female cast. Tonye Patano (“Weeds”) toplined the story about four estranged sisters who come together to make a quilt in honor of their late mother. The play opened at the Arena Stage in D.C. in 2015.
Currently, Hall is working on bringing her 2011 play “Hurt Village” to the screen. Depicting the dissolution of a Memphis public-housing complex, “Hurt Village” won the Edgerton Foundation New American Play Award and the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. It was also workshopped into a screenplay at Sundance Screenwriters Lab. Hall plans to make her feature directorial debut with the film adaptation. Hall’s short film “Arkabutla,” about a family trip that is ruined by an act of racism, is currently in post-production.
