By Takara Small

For the cast of Memphis, future success lies in the ability to recreate the past every night through the real-life story of Dewey Phillips, a white DJ who started a musical revolution in the segregated southern United States during the 1950s. Now the play, which earned Tony Awards for Best Book, Best Score and Best Musical, is about ready to wrap it up on a Toronto stage.

Veteran stage actress Felicia Boswell stars as an aspiring Black singer who does the unthinkable and falls for the sweet-talking, fast-moving white boy from the other side of town. “My character (also named Felicia) falls in love with a white DJ, which was forbidden back then and speaks to how things have changed,” she says.

But the play, on until Dec. 24 at the Toronto Centre for the Arts, is more than a star-crossed love odyssey. It successfully pulls off a rare feat by serving as entertainment and educational fodder for audiences through a combination of the ups and downs of a music legend’s life, and America’s very racist, very troubled past of systematic segregation, deep-seated bigotry and interracial intolerance.

For Boswell, the overwhelming and raw energy she puts into every performance can be attributed to her close connection to the main character’s roots—both are Southern girls. Her upbringing, she says, helps her to embody Memphis’ Felicia. “Growing up in the South, you can’t not know about the past and the civil rights challenges,” she says.

As a cousin of the famed Rosa Parks and proud Alabamian, Boswell also insists the play is true to the times it’s meant to reflect.

In fact, the story, which is told through every sideways glance, verbal spat and slap common of the era, is very worthy of attention, she says, even if the racist acts depicted are unacceptable by today’s standards.
“We don’t have to deal with those things as much as they did back in that time, but there’s still a lot of prejudices happening and I think it’s important that people know,” says Boswell. “It’s also important to share these stories to let younger people know where we’ve come from and how far we still have to go.”

Bryan Fenkart, the male lead and Felicia’s love interest agrees. “Even though we’re not throwing around those kinda words [heard in the play] anymore and even though particular aspects like segregation don’t happen, what’s behind it is still very much alive and needs to be addressed.”

Memphis is at the Toronto Centre for the Arts until Dec. 24. For more details, visit, tocentre.com

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