Actor-Singer Activist Bryan Terrell Clark (Diarra From Detroit): "Joy Can Be Resistance"

Show Notes

Dennis is joined via Zoom by actor Bryan Terrell Clark who plays a gay teacher "Mr. Tea" on the BET+ mystery-comedy series Diarra From Detroit. Bryan talks about how he knew the show's creator and star Diarra Kilpatrick for years before working with her and how thrilled he was to learn she was writing the role of Mr. Tea with him in mind. He also talks about how he sees Mr. Tea as the Bea Arthur-esque truthteller of the ensemble and how gratifying it is to play the type of gay character he would have liked to seen when he was growing up. He also talks about growing up in Baltimore with a pastor for mother and a drug dealer and addict for a father and how both of those experiences shaped the man he is today. He also shares the incredible story of how he came to believe in God after his father failed to pick him up from middle school leaving him feeling totally abandoned and alone as night fell and how he found salvation in the most unlikely of places. Other topics include: the profound connection he felt to Marvin Gaye when the played the singer in Motown: The Musical on Broadway, what it was like to deliver George Washington's farewell address in Hamilton on stage at the same time that President Obama was giving his own farewell address in Washington, the idea that "being gay is not romantic," which is a line Mr. Tea says in Diarra From Detroit, slaying on the red carpet with help from his costume designer husband, how he sees expressing black and queer joy as a kind of resistance and what Gay Pride means to him. (www.bryanterrellclark.com)