Photo from Tantallon Community Players Brian Donohue is Police Chief Bill Gillespie and Charles Watley is Detective Virgil Tibbs in Tantallon Community Players' "In the Heat of the Night."

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Photo from Tantallon Community Players Brian Donohue is Police Chief Bill Gillespie and Charles Watley is Detective Virgil Tibbs in Tantallon Community Players' "In the Heat of the Night."

 

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It’s 1962. A murder takes place in a small Southern town. The police haul the nearest black man down to the station for questioning.

This is how theater audiences will meet Virgil Tibbs in Tantallon Community Players’ presentation of “In the Heat of the Night,” opening Friday at Harmony Hall Regional Center.

Although times have changed, the lessons presented in the racially charged mystery are just as important now as they were 50 years ago, says Tantallon artistic director and founder Charla Rowe.

“I know prejudice still exists and think this play makes us aware of it and helps us to deal with it” Rowe says.

“Night” is being staged in honor of Black History Month, and features a cast of 13 men and two women, Rowe says. The production is stylized with a minimal set and uses light effects to set the tone for the complex and often harsh play.

First a book by John Ball, then a 1967 film starring Sidney Poitier and Rod Steiger, “In the Heat of the Night” tells the story of black Pasadena police detective Tibbs, who is wrongfully accused of murder while passing through town on the way to visit his mother.

When it is discovered that Tibbs is a detective and had nothing to do with the murder, his chief back in Pasadena suggests to local police chief Bill Gillespie that Tibbs remain and help solve the case, much to the chagrin of the two men.

“They’re both put in this position of one-upping each other,” Rowe says.

For actor Charles Watley, the most difficult part of playing Tibbs is maintaining his silent dignity without looking cold and uncaring.

“I am trying to show the people who live in this town that I’m not just another African American. I’m Virgil Tibbs and I’m here to do my job just like any other man would,” says Watley, 21, of La Plata, who has been performing with Tantallon for three years.

While other characters in the play may curse like sailors, Virgil is eloquent and wants to show them he is intelligent and earn their respect.

“He wants to talk to them, not just as an investigator but a person of authority,” Watley says.

Throughout the course of the play, Tibbs does earn the respect of some of the local townspeople, but for others like the members of the Ku Klux Klan he encounters Watley believes hatred has been engrained for too many generations to be singularly changed by his actions.

“The deeper you go in the South, the stronger the bonds are of holding to the tradition that African Americans are a lesser species are not even humans,” Watley says.

Watley, who is black, says he believes “In the Heat of the Night” is an important story for his culture to realize where they came from, and to remember the lessons from history and “not to waste them.”

“You can be any type of person you want to be. You don’t have to submit to the stereotypes,” he says.

Brian Donohue portrays Gillespie, who he says comes to respect Tibbs, but still holds on to many of his prejudices.

“There is a line near the end where he says to Virgil, ‘You’re a credit to your race.’ I don’t think that is something you would say to somebody if you still didn’t hold prejudice,” says Donohue, 46, of White Plains.

The entertaining part about “In the Heat of the Night” is that the story finds a way to deal with heavy-handed issues while still being entertaining, Donohue says.

“It’s clever because it’s a murder mystery, and certainly the racial element is there, but I think it’s something people can enjoy if they never heard of racism or encountered it,” he says. “It’s a clever way to address and bring up these kinds of issues.”

Donohue’s older sister, Sharon, went to school in Charles County the first year schools were integrated, and civil rights is something he has seen evolve throughout his lifetime. He believes that it is important to have stories like “In the Heat of the Night” to keep a dialogue going about equality issues still seen today.

“I think we’re closer,” he says. “I think things get better and have gotten better, but there will always be people that dislike other people.”

ccalamaio@gazette.net