In 1845, Frederick Douglass was living in intense fear. Living on the run after escaping slavery in Maryland seven years earlier, he had just published his first memoir, “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave,” which both told his powerful personal story and argued for slavery’s abolition. Fearing recapture by Southern slavers, Douglass set sail for what would become a lecture tour of Britain and Ireland.
“Under the flickering light of the North Star,” Douglass wrote, “stood a doubtful freedom — half frozen — beckoning us to come share its hospitality.”
These words and other reflections of Douglass’s visits to Belfast form the basis of “North Star,” a moving, meditative and propulsive 70-minute music and spoken word performance, created and directed by the British D.J. Kwame Daniels, that recently opened at the Irish Arts Center in Manhattan. Interwoven with Douglass’s own words are responses from young people and performers about what “home” means to them.
Standing center stage during a recent rehearsal, Zasha Singh, 11, recited her poem “New York Is My Home”: “I love everything in New York. Everyone speaks different languages! ‘Hello,’ ‘Hola,’ ‘Shalom,’ ‘Bonjour,’ ‘Wa alaikum assalam!’”
Later, Singh, a fifth grader from P.S. 69 in Queens, said her experience of New York was “so welcoming. I’m Indian and Muslim. Where I live in Jackson Heights, there are so many diverse cultures. I love that.”
Alysha Ciprian, 17, read a wrenching poem about grieving the recent death of her father. “New York is missing this special person,” she said afterward. “It won’t ever be the same, but it will always be my home.”
“North Star,” produced in association with the Lyric Theater Belfast, premiered in that city in 2024. The show begins with a Douglass quote — “Wherever else I feel myself to be a stranger, I will remember I have a home in Belfast” — spoken by the disembodied voice of the actor Colin Salmon playing the abolitionist. His words are interspersed with a rousing live soundtrack of hip-hop, rap, funk and gospel, led by Kaidi Tatham, and the poems of young people from Belfast (here on video) and New York (in person).
“I’m rewriting the history, trying to shed the skin of all the layers that were missed by me,” writes Jaleel Brown Howard, a 15-year-old 10th grader, about moving from Georgia to New York. Joseph Pucci, 15, writes a witty paean to his uncle Phillix, “the first person in our family to go to college, and who set me on that path too,” he said.
Shola Jinadu, 10, sings her poem, “Why New York Feels Like Home,” later saying of its genesis, “This place is home. I would rather be here some of the time than any place in the world.”
The young performers share the stage with a choir and band. Positioned among the audience members roaming around the space are three podiums, where the poet Nandi Jola, the singer-songwriter Winnie Ama and the rapper OneDa, whose songs are written by Leo Miyagee, perform. (There are seats for audience members who require them.)
“The show is immersive because I want to literally bring people closer to Black culture and Black people, spatially and on the same level, to encourage empathy and compassion,” Daniels said.
For Aidan Connolly, the executive director of the Irish Arts Center, the show “feels like a ritual, a coming together.”
“I can’t imagine what Frederick Douglass went through,” Tatham said. “I so respect what he did.” One of OneDa’s raps goes, “Shall I pack my bags and run away? Should I hedge my bets and stay?” A British lesbian born to Nigerian parents, OneDa said the show “represents Black struggle and resilience and the importance of allies, as the Irish were to Frederick Douglass.”
For Daniels, a 51-year-old Londoner of Ghanaian heritage who moved to Belfast in 1997, the themes of “North Star” were sharpened when anti-immigration riots broke out in Belfast and other British towns and cities in the summer of 2024, mere months before the show’s premiere. (A new wave of riots erupted this week after a man was stabbed in Belfast.)
The riots “shattered,” Daniels said, his “sense of home” as a Black person living in Belfast. And yet, he added, many thousands of people marched against anti-immigrant sentiment, mirroring the city’s citizens in the 19th century who mobilized to ensure ships carrying enslaved people never launched from Belfast’s port. Douglass would eventually write three autobiographies detailing his experiences and beliefs. He died in 1895 at around 77 years old. A bronze statue of Douglass was unveiled in Belfast in 2023.
Before “North Star,” in 2020, Daniels founded Solab, a digital platform for artists across Africa and the African diaspora in response to the murder of George Floyd. Performing “North Star” is especially pertinent now, he said, “while there are so many forces dividing and tearing us apart, and when people feel more emboldened to be openly racist. Also, young people’s voices are often overlooked. I’m glad this show gives them the space to express themselves.”
Another of those young performers, Ashly Fernandez Nuñez, 16, was inspired by “Hamilton.” Her passionately recited poem evokes the highs and lows of living in New York. “The point of life is to push through tough situations to be your better self,” she said. “Expressing that in art can make it into something beautiful.”
The post Frederick Douglass Asked, What Is Home? New York Teens Answer. appeared first on New York Times.
