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.