Gin Hammond in Returning the Bones (John Ulman) |
Written and performed by Gin Hammond
Book-It Repertory Theatre
(at Erickson Theatre)
through May 14, 2019
I saw an iteration of this production in 2010, as Gin Hammond was developing it. It was so solid then that I think much of her current production is similar to that stunning event. I truly regard her as one of our country's best solo artists. Here, she has created a play using a fascinating character in her own family.
Based on the life and times of her aunt, Dr. Carolyn (Bebe) Hammond Montier, it’s about Montier’s struggle, as an African-American, to achieve everything anyone might dream of, a medical degree, and her extraordinary opportunity, in 1946, to represent Howard University at a medical congregation in Europe following World War II. Montier also went to the concentration camp, Auschwitz, in Poland, where she saw bones of recent camp internees.