Dramatic act to save Interfaith

The fight to save Interfaith Medical Center in central Brooklyn has taken many dramatic turns of late. Most poignantly, the staging of Edward Albee’s “The Death of Bessie Smith” in the hospital. The play is based on the legend that this great blues singer was left to die when a whites-only hospital refused to treat her after a car accident. “We wanted to raise awareness about Interfaith and to provoke a conversation about race, class, and healthcare,” says Jeff Strabone, chair of the New Brooklyn Theater, which is staging the play 

And so they have.

The backstory of this production is one of “wonderful coincidences,” says Jeff. New Brooklyn Theater is a new theater company based in Bedford-Stuyvesant and dedicated, in part, to filling the need for performing arts in the community. Jeff, who is active in the fight to save LICH and was among those arrested last July in the protest action that helped fuel Mayor de Blasio’s campaign, “wanted to help bring the two fights, LICH and Interfaith, together.” Jonathan Solari, the play’s director, suggested staging the play at Interfaith. Edward Albee generously gave his permission, so long as tickets were free and no one was paid. Jeff’s cold call to Interfaith led him to hospital board member Diane Porter who said yes right away.

Public spotlight

The production, in a meeting room, is extraordinary. Tickets were gone in a heartbeat. And the extensive coverage (including The New York Times, NY1, CBC Radio Canada, online, and a Perez Hilton tweet to his more than 6 million followers) has brought Interfaith’s plight into the public spotlight. “It’s a dream,” says Jeff, “to stage a great play by a great playwright and to see that doing so may influence an outcome in the material world.”

It’s too soon to know how the real-life drama will end. One thing’s for certain: Everyone has a part to play in the fight to save Interfaith and other hospitals. As we go to press, the production has been extended. As an email from the New Brooklyn Theater put it: “We want to keep doing the show until a solution is found to keep Interfaith open or until they turn the lights off with us still in the building.”