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The cast of Four Little Girls: Birmingham 1963 at the Alabama Shakespeare Festival
Photo Credit: the Alabama Shakespeare Festival
The Privilege of Power:
Promise Over Trauma in Alabama
An Interview with Tangela Large, Director of Four Little Girls
WR ITTEN BY ALEX ATES
T
o inaugurate 2019, the Alabama
Shakespeare Festival in Montomery
programed Christina Ham’s Theatre
for Young Audiences (TYA) play Four
Little Girls: Birmingham 1963 on their
mainstage with a cast of 24 students from the
Montgomery Public School System (MPS)—which
is currently under state takeover. Ham’s play
meditates on the stolen potential of four young lives
lost to American terrorism in the 16th Street Baptist
Church bombing in Birmingham, Ala. during the civil
rights struggle. Instead of emphasizing their murder,
the play honors the dignity of Addie Mae Collins,
Cynthia D. Morris Wesley, and Carole Robertson.
The production was directed by Tangela Large, a
professor at the University of West Georgia.
This interview was originally conducted for
Howlround in the piece “Terror, Strength, Pain,
Brilliance, and Children in Four Little Girls,” and is
published, in full, with their permission.
Alex Ates: For a major regional theatre to program
a TYA production with a cast exclusively with young