Acclaimed actress Akuyoe touches inner 'spirit'

Wednesday, March 1, 1995

Acclaimed actress Akuyoe touches inner 'spirit'

Show strives to find 'common language' of diverse audiences

By Gaby Mora

Daily Bruin Staff

Nelson Mandela was still in prison, the Berlin Wall was still intact and reg fees were about a third of what we now pay when the renowned actress Akuyoe wrote the one-woman play she performed at UCLA in 1993.

But as "Spirit Awakening" makes its second round through the university this Saturday night at the Freud Theater, Mandela rules as president of South Africa, and the world looks and feels a little better ­ except for those reg fees, of course.

Set in the '80s, the play is an autobiographical odyssey of an African woman rediscovering her identity. At the same time, the show symbolizes the repression that exists outside the theater walls.

Considering the changes since she first presented her play, Akuyoe says, "I think its a classic piece, and I say that, not from a sense of my ego, but because that's just what has happened."

Presented by the Earth Trust Foundation, the UCLA Center for African American Studies and the UCLA Center for Performing Arts, "Spirit Awakening" has grown beyond just a stage performance. In addition to acting, Akuyoe also teaches workshops for incarcerated and at-risk youth through the Spirit Awakening Foundation, which she describes as "an arts organization first and foremost."

"It really is about supporting creativity and supporting dreams," she explains. "I want to support young people in personal growth and development, beyond books and paper."

"Some of the young people are coming to the show," she says, "I wanted them to see a place of higher learning, an institution like UCLA where there are so many different cultures. I thought that might inspire them, and again, a lot of them have never even been on the Westside. So (Saturday's performance) is serving many different purposes."

Akuyoe found this exposure to a variety of experiences critical to her own self-discovery. A native of Ghana, Africa, Akuyoe has traveled the world, and considers the people she has encountered in her travels as her greatest source of wisdom.

"I've had a very good education by anybody's standards, and yet I found that within the (educational) system a lot of things didn't work for me, so I had to learn to create and really find my own unique voice," she recalls.

"I felt that a lot of the situations I was in did not support my own unique voice ... I think that in life, people need to be seen and heard for who they really are, and so many times the educational system suppresses that," Akuyoe says.

In "Spirit Awakening," Akuyoe takes a unique approach to relay these experiences. "In a lot of one-person shows, the actors come on stage and they bring suitcases, or whatever, and they become different people by putting on a hat and gloves, different costumes. But in 'Spirit Awakening,' the woman you see, all the baggage that she carries is inside of her. So what happens is that she unravels, and before the eyes of the audience, I am able to turn and become all these different people, men and women, black and white," she says.

"(However) the play is much more than the politics of race and color, and gender," she continues. "But if someone doesn't read, doesn't hear anything, just doesn't know, they'll be able to get it on that other level. And that's how I'm able to work with the population that I work with. Because this play gets the heart pumping, people can relate to that. People who have seen my play, from Chinese to French, to Spanish to African, to Arabic to Jew, to Christian to Occidental, it doesn't matter, it's like your experiences are uniquely yours, but there is still a common language."

Akuyoe recognizes UCLA as an institution striving for that common language, and since 1993, when Dr. Beverly Robinson brought about 80 students from the drama department to the first campus showing of "Spirit Awakening," the actress has kept close ties with the university.

As for Saturday's performance, Akuyoe says she strives for her audience to really get a taste and a touch of the "invincible spirit of life which imbues and animates every being everywhere."

THEATER: "Spirit Awakening" benefit performance, Saturday, March 4, 8 p.m. at the UCLA Freud Playhouse. Tickets are $35 ($25 for groups of 10 or more), $10 for seniors/students. To order tickets, or for more info call the UCLA Ticket Box Office at (310) 825-2101 or TicketMaster at (213) 365-3500.