About the Play:

Abe Lincoln and Uncle Tom in the White House is a full-length comedic drama by Carlyle Brown. A play about slavery and freedom that imagines a meeting between President Abraham Lincoln and the fictional Uncle Tom in the White House. The slave tries to understand the world outside the novel Uncle Tom's Cabin while Lincoln endeavors to discover the aspirations of black Americans.

Abe Lincoln and Uncle Tom in the White House imagines a worried President Abraham Lincoln alone in the Executive Office on September 22, 1862. He is struggling with signing his great executive order the Emancipation Proclamation when he is mysteriously visited by Uncle Tom, the fictional slave who is the hero in Harriet Beecher Stowe's abolitionist novel Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly, serialized in a magazine and then published in 1852. These two iconic characters from life and literature – one real, the other fiction – in a surrealistic interaction where they attempt to understand each other across a chasm of race in the midst of the Civil War. Throughout one late night and into the dawning day, they find themselves crossing over into each other's world in a tale of suffering, self-discovery, and redemption.

Abe Lincoln and Uncle Tom in the White House premiered in 2014 at the Guthrie Theater's Dowling Studio in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Since then the play has been mounted by high schools, colleges, and community theatres.

Cast: 2 female, 2 male

What people say:

"[A] meaty and ingenious one-act…a crafty conversation, based on an absurd setup, on freedom and slavery, on war and faith…[Brown] is a master of this type of interrogation of historical figures…In Abe Lincoln and Uncle Tom in the White House, he shows the historical power of Uncle Tom…even as he attempts to rescue him from being a byword for betrayal. This Uncle Tom is a man of providence and progress…Abe Lincoln and Uncle Tom in the White House, which packs a punch in 75 minutes, [is] excellent work that is not to be missed." — Star Tribune (Minneapolis)

About the Playwright:

Carlyle Brown is an African American playwright, performer, and the artistic director of the Minneapolis-based Carlyle Brown & Company, which he founded in Minneapolis in 2002. Known for his historical works about African Americans, he has a long and rich history of creating plays that dramatize historical events in a way that makes them accessible to present-day audiences. Described by The New York Times as "one of America's more significant playwrights" he received the 2018 William Inge Distinguished Achievement in the American Theater Award at the William Inge Theater Festival.