Public Screening Of “Gator Tales”
2017
The Samuel Proctor Oral History Program in conjunction with Gainesville Community Redevelopment Agency hosted a free film screening of “Gator Tales,” the award-winning theatrical performance which highlights the experiences of the first generation of African American students at the University of Florida.
“Gator Tales” is an original play devised and directed by UF Arts Professor Kevin Marshall in conjunction with the Proctor Program at UF which premiered in 2015. This special film of the live theatre performance brings vividly to life the voices of those African Americans in Gainesville who struggled for civil rights and educational equality for all. Gator Tales was nominated for the 2015 Freedom Expression of Award by Amnesty International at the Edinburgh Festival in Scotland.
Special Guests and Performances:
The Flossie B. McLendon Memorial and Reichert House Drill Teams will perform color guard presentation.
Special guests will perform dance entitled “Young, Gifted and Black,” and sing the “Negro National Anthem”
An invocation by Prophet George Young III will be followed by opening remarks from Commissioner Golston
The character’s stories in “Gator Tales” are drawn from the oral history archive of the Samuel Proctor Oral History Program. Interviews with Joel Buchanan, Ron Coleman, Bernard Hicks, Thomas Holland Fay, Joseph McCloud, Maime Lee Leath, Evelyn Moore Mickle, Stephan Mickle, Leitha Nichols, David Padgett, Laura Scott Reaves, Samuel Taylor, Gladys Thompson and Albert White are featured in the production.
For more information please contact:
The Samuel Proctor Oral History Program, 352-392- 7168
Tamarra Jenkins, tamarraj@ufl.edu
Nigel Hamm with Gainesville Community Redevelopment Agency, (352) 393-8202 or HammN1@cityofgainesville.org