Slave Play is a three-act play by Jeremy O. HarrisMegarry, Daniel. "Jeremy O. Harris". Gay Times (09506101), Mar. 2019, pp. 32–35. about race, sex, power relations, trauma, and interracial relationships.Lapacazo Sandoval, Contributing Writer. Slave Play' by Jeremy O. Harris a Real Look at Racism in America —Opening on Broadway, Oc-Tober 6." Los Angeles Sentinel (CA), October 9, 2019. It follows three interracial couples undergoing "Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy" because the black partners have begun struggling to feel arousal or pleasure when engaging sexually with their white partners. The title refers both to the history of slavery in the United States and to sexual slavery role-play.
Harris originally wrote the play in his first year at the Yale School of Drama, and it debuted on a major stage on November 19, 2018, in an Off-Broadway New York Theatre Workshop staging directed by Robert O'Hara. It opened on Broadway at the John Golden Theatre on October 6, 2019. In 2019, Slave Play was nominated for Best Play in the Lucille Lortel Awards, and Claire Warden won an Outstanding Fight Choreography Drama Desk Award for her work in the play. The play has been the center of controversy due to its themes and content.PINKINS, TONYA. “Racism Doesn’t Have a Safe Word.” American Theatre, vol. 36, no. 6, July 2019, pp. 40–41. At the 74th Tony Awards, Slave Play received 12 nominations, breaking the record set by the 2018 revival of Angels in America for most nominations for a non-musical play, though it did not receive any awards. The record was broken in 2024 when Stereophonic received 13 nominations.
Characters
Kaneisha – A 28-year-old black woman who is in a relationship with Jim. She plays a slave in the first act and has anhedonia. She speaks in a natural Southern dialect throughout. Jim – A 35-year-old wealthy white man who is in a relationship with Kaneisha. He plays a slave overseer in the first act, and has a British accent in the following acts. Phillip – A 30-year-old mixed-race man who is in a relationship with Alana. He plays a mulatto servant in the first act and he has anhedonia. Alana – A 36-year-old white woman who is in a relationship with Phillip. She plays a mistress in the first act. Dustin – A 28-year-old gay Latino man who is in a relationship with Gary. He is called "a white man but the lowest type of white—dingy, and off-white" despite being of another race. He plays an indentured servant in the first act. Gary – A 27-year-old gay black man who is in a relationship with Dustin. He plays a black overseer in the first act and he has anhedonia. Teá – A 26-year-old light-skinned black woman who is in a relationship with Patricia. She studies black feminism and queer theory, and is conducting a study in Racialized Inhibiting Disorder in interracial couples with Patricia. Patricia – A 30-year-old mixed-race Latina woman who is in a relationship with Teá. She studies cognitive psychology, and is holding a study in Racialized Inhibiting Disorder in interracial couples with Teá.Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 39-67.
Plot
Act One: "Work" At McGregor Plantation, a southern cotton plantation in pre-Civil War Virginia, the song "Work" by Rihanna plays in the overseer cottage.Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 42-50 Kaneisha, a slave, begins to twerk to the song when Jim, a white slave owner, walks in holding a whip. Jim is repeatedly uncomfortable when Kaneisha calls him "Master," but berates her for not cleaning the room better and throws a cantaloupe on the ground and tells Kaneisha to eat it. As Kaneisha eats the cantaloupe, she begins to dance again, which confuses and arouses Jim. The overseer then initiates sex with Kaneisha. When she asks to be called a "nasty, lazy negress," he instead proceeds to perform cunnilingus.
At her boudoir, Madame McGregor, the wife of Master McGregor, or Alana, calls upon Phillip, her mulatto servant, and asks him to play the fiddle. Phillip begins to play Beethoven's Op. 132. Alana stops him, calling European music boring, and asks him to play "negro" music. Phillip plays "Pony" by Ginuwine and Alana dances, then initiates sex, saying she is under Phillip's mulatto spell. She then uses a dildo to penetrate him, asking him if he likes being in the woman's position. Phillip replies that he is unsure.
In the McGregor's barn, Gary, a black slave, is in charge of Dustin, a white indentured servant. Gary taunts Dustin, finding their allocation of power amusing. Gary kicks Dustin down, calling him lesser than other white people. The song “Multi-Love” by Unknown Mortal Orchestra begins to play. The two fight before they engage in sexual intimacy. Gary has Dustin lick Gary's boot clean; this causes Gary to orgasm. He starts crying and cannot be comforted by Dustin.
Meanwhile, Phillip keeps playing music that Alana does not like on his fiddle and Kaneisha and Jim are engaged in sex. Kaneisha asks again to be called a "negress." Even as Kaneisha nears orgasm, Jim stops participating when Kaneisha calls him "Masta Jim". Jim then switches to speaking in a British accent and tells Kaneisha that he is not comfortable with the situation. Jim uses his safeword, "Starbucks," to end the encounter.
New characters in modern clothing, Patricia and Teá (also an interracial couple) then come into the room. They recommend for the three couples to meet back at the main house soon. It is revealed that in reality the characters are modern couples participating in a role-playing exercise meant to improve intimacy between white and black partners.
Act Two: "Process" There is a contemporary group therapy session among the three couples to treat their inability to experience sexual pleasure. The therapists, Patricia and Teá, speak through affirmations and academic jargon for most of the session.Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 50-64 They are on Day Four of the therapy, which focuses on fantasy play.
Dustin begins by noting that Gary came, which he could not do before, but Gary counters that Dustin was uncomfortable in making his whiteness hyper-visible. Alana enjoyed the release of the fantasy and asks Phillip if he enjoyed it too, noting that he got an erection when he had trouble before. Jim keeps interrupting speakers with laughter; Teá asks him to share, especially since he was the one who said the safeword. Jim is confused and overwhelmed by the therapy. Teá clarifies that the therapy, titled Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy, was designed to help black partners feel pleasure again with their white partners. Jim is uncomfortable playing the role of the slave overseer and demeaning his wife, and believes the experience is traumatizing and ruining his relationship with Kaneisha. Kaneisha feels frustrated and betrayed that Jim did not give what she asked of him.
After Patricia and Teá read back to the group what they have said, Alana points out that mostly white men are speaking. Dustin insists that he is not white. Dustin and Gary get back into an old argument over Dustin wanting to move into a more gentrified neighborhood. Dustin refuses to label himself as white, and Gary feels that through this he erases Gary's identity. Phillip, who has not spoken much, says that the therapy seems fake to him. Alana speaks over him, still upset about Jim saying the safeword.
Patricia and Teá explain the origins of Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy in treating anhedonia, with Patricia speaking over Teá. The couple shaped it as their thesis together at Smith and then Yale. They are foregrounding the study both through their experiences in their own relationship and their academic background. They state that anhedonia is caused by racial trauma passed down through history: black partners may be unable to enjoy sex with their white partners because of “Racialized Inhibiting Disorder." Teá previously experienced anhedonia with Patricia, and it was through fantasy play that she worked out her racial trauma. Symptoms associated with Racialized Inhibiting Disorder include anxiety, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and "musical obsession disorder."
Phillip says none of his partners are able to see him as black and he struggles with being mixed race. Gary realizes that the song he often hears, “Multi-Love”, was imagined due to "musical obsession disorder." Kaneisha says she felt in control during the fantasy play, but Jim took that away from her by using the safeword; Gary agrees but Phillip does not. It is revealed that Phillip and Alana met because her ex-husband had a cuckold fetish, and that when Phillip was with her under those pretenses, he felt sexually excited because he was viewed as black by her husband, thus affirming a sense of categorized sexual identity other than just “Phillip” after a lifetime of feeling like he didn’t belong as “black” or “white.” Alana insists it had nothing to do with race, and now that they are in a committed relationship Alana views him as a complex person. Alana breaks down. Gary confronts Dustin, asking why he always says he is not white. Gary questions why they are still together, and he and Dustin almost get into a fight before Patricia and Teá break it up.
Jim starts to read something he wrote on his phone. He does not understand why Kaneisha looks at him with disgust, like he is "a virus," nor does he know what he is supposed to do. Kaneisha realizes that "virus" is the description she has been searching for, referencing the diseases introduced by Europeans which decimated the indigenous peoples of the Americas. She says she knows now that she cannot experience pleasure because she cannot forget her disgust with Jim's race. She confronts Patricia and Teá, saying they are wrong: the problem is within the white partners, not a disorder within the black partners. Kaneisha is overwhelmed as “Work” by Rihanna begins playing again.
Act Three: "Exorcise" Source:
"Work" plays as Kaneisha is packing in a room and Jim comes in. Kaneisha says that what she needs is not better communication, but for Jim to simply listen. Jim is silent as Kaneisha recounts how they met, and then times in her childhood when she had to visit plantations on school field trips. As the only black girl, she felt a need to act proud for her "elders" watching her. She says she fell in love with Jim, a white man, because he was not American.Harris, Jeremy O. "Slave Play." American Theatre, no. 6, 2019, p. 64-67 Jim begins to initiate foreplay and the music rises while Kaneisha continues that the relationship went downhill three years ago, when she stopped feeling sexual pleasure because she began to see him as foreign and frightening. She saw Jim's whiteness and power, and that he also has "the virus", because though he is not American, he benefits from being white while being unaware of the privilege that whiteness gives him. She says that Antebellum Sexual Performance Therapy and the fantasy play gave her a sense of peace because she feels the elders watching her again; the elders do not care that she is with "a demon / who thinks he’s a saint", but simply want the two of them to know he is a demon.
Jim calls Kaneisha a "negress" and gags her; the music stops. Jim returns to performing his slave owner role, dominating and insulting Kaneisha. She silently consents to continue, but when Jim initiates forceful sex she struggles free and screams the safeword. She begins to cry, then laugh, and Jim cries as well as they comfort each other. Kaneisha stands and thanks Jim for listening.
Themes