About the Project
A self-styled playwright finds himself trapped within destructive family dynamics, self-imposed deadlines, and an almost infernal inner-critic that begins to become corporeal. Inspired by the murder of aspiring actress, Patricia Cowen in 1978 in Detroit, HAMMER offers no excuses but rather an empathetic inquisition into the deterioration a young man’s mind.
June 7, 9, 14, 16 | The Belfry Stage, Upstairs @ the Crown
11031 Camarillo St, North Hollywood, CA 91602
buy tickets here: https://hammer.brownpapertickets.com/
A NOTE FROM THE PLAYWRIGHT: I first came across this story in an essay written by Audre Lorde called Sexism: An American Disease in Blackface, in which she attempts to address black male aggression towards the black female body. She asks the question, how is “their manhood so threatened that Black women should be the prime targets of their justifiable rage?”
I scoured the internet for details on the case but save for a blurry copy of an article in the New York Times, I found nothing. What intrigued me the most was not that Patricia’s vulnerability and desire resonated with me, but that I felt sympathy for (or at least a curiosity of) the murderer.
I wanted to write a play that addresses Lorde’s assertion that black men respond to white “capitalist oppression” by asserting dominance over black women but also a play that addresses implosion, desperation, need and desire.
While some details (both strange and true) were pulled directly from research of the case, most of the characters and their journeys are of the my own invention. This play neither serves as an accurate account of the events that took place on that tragic day nor as an acquittal of anyone’s actions but rather as an inquisition.
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Production Team
