DETROIT – During Black History Month this weekend, an exciting musical called Ruby will make its debut in Detroit.
It’s the powerful, untold story of an affluent Black couple in Live Oak, Florida, in the 1940s and 1950s.
It’s a story of resilience, racism, and injustice brought to the Detroit Music Hall stage by our media partners, Times Media and the Michigan Chronicle.
Local 4 interviewed Hiram Jackson, the CEO, writer, director, and lead actor of a production destined for Broadway.
Ruby the Musical recounts the true story of Ruby McCollum, a prominent Black businesswoman in the Jim Crow south of northern Florida.
On trial for the murder of a white doctor, first brought to the stage by Nate Jacobs, the founder and artistic director of the Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe, an acclaimed 200-seat theater in Sarasota, Florida, along with his brother Michael, who wrote the play.
“It’s a super interesting story,” said Hiram Jackson. “Her and her husband, Sam McCollum, were running a very strong business. It was illegal; it was the numbers (Lottery), but they were highly respected. She was wearing mink coats. She had a mansion. They were well respected. And so it was unusual to see a Black couple like that in the 40s and 50s in Florida. But, one of the things about owning these old iconic brands is they came with a lot of magical archives.”
Jackson continued:
“Any story that has been told in the Black community and really in the world has been told through the eyes of the Pittsburgh Courier, the Chicago Defender, and The Michigan Chronicle; the story was told by Zora Neale Hurston, the famous poet, and playwright she was working for the Pittsburgh Courier at the time, and was dispatched to sit in the trial every day to report this story to Black people around the world. Black people were up in arms because they had heard about how this Black woman was being mistreated by her white doctor. She was being drugged and really took advantage of her and her husband. We get these random calls from these two brothers out of Florida. They want access to our archives.”
When asked what drew them to Ruby’s story, Nate Jacobs, the director of Ruby the Musical and artistic director of Westcoast Black Theatre Troupe, said, “She didn’t get lynched, and she had a trial. When do they bring us to a trial?”
The question people had back then was, “Who was this woman?”
“I’m pretty clear that throughout the time that they were operating in Live Oak, they were doing it with the participation of some very powerful white men in that community, the judge, the sheriff,” said Michael Jacobs, playwriter for Ruby The Musical and labor, empowerment and entertainment attorney. “And so the mystery inset, why? What are they protecting? What did this woman have over them? And why she felt there was a need to murder this man in broad daylight on a Sunday morning.
McCollum told them that he had to be a part of the musical.
“I got to be a part of it. I gave them the rights to do the story, and I started visiting Sarasota to go to some of their musicals, and I was blown away. It was so professional. It was so majestic. The costumes were amazing. Their music is original,” McCollum said.
Catara Brae, 24, is the actress who plays the lead role of Ruby. She said the stage inside the Detroit Music Hall was the biggest she’d ever performed on.
“A gifted, natural actress, because not only is she a singer, the role and the work she does as the actress is phenomenal,” Nate said.
Brae will be performing in front of 1,700 people.
“I came in this theater the first day, and I stood on that stage. I said, ‘Wow, this is real,’” Nate said.
When asked if Broadway seemed that far away since hitting the stage in Detroit, Nate said it doesn’t.
--> Enter the win: 4 tickets to see ‘Ruby: the Musical’ at the Detroit Music Hall
Ruby the Musical opens Friday (Feb. 7) at 8 p.m. at the Detroit Music Hall for the Performing Arts. Tickets start at $35. The show also runs on Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday matinees at 3 p.m.
On Friday, part two of the story will feature Detroit’s impression of the brothers from Florida, which will make you all proud.
Also, on Local 4+, Rhonda had a conversation with Jackson, during which they discussed the importance of his publication, The Michigan Chronicle, his work highlighting Black Detroiters, and his commitment to preserving an archive of Black History.
