Unflinching look at human trafficking in ‘52 Letters’
The Ubuntu Theater production offers an emotional call to action
“Human trafficking” seems like such an inadequate term to talk about children stolen from their homes, unspeakably violated and forced into sexual servitude. In “52 Letters,” Oakland anti-trafficking activist and “modern-day abolitionist” Regina Evans takes an unflinching look at a horrific reality that most people cannot help but flinch at — and that’s precisely the problem. At every turn, Evans emphasizes that it’s not just the abductors and rapists, the pimps and johns that perpetuate this horror of sexual slavery, but also everyone who turns a blind eye and does nothing to help. Evans is the proprietor of Regina’s Door, an Oakland vintage clothing boutique and sanctuary for survivors of sex trafficking. She wrote and performs “52 Letters,” which won a Best of Fringe award in the 2013 San Francisco Fringe Festival, and now Ubuntu Theater Project gives the piece a full theatrical run. Performed in a back room of the Flax art supply store in downtown Oakland, “52 Letters” isn’t a solo show per se. Dressed all in white as Evans is in black, vocalist Rashida Chase sings beautiful, passionate a cappella spirituals that punctuate and leaven the narrative, often just when it seems too much to bear. She sits virtually expressionless in a lace-strewn white chair the rest of the time. Evans’ face, and indeed her entire body, is a whirlwind of emotion as she speaks. As we begin her frame is stooped, her visage in a resonant frown of deep sorrow. It’s like a howl of anguish. When her face lights up in a smile it’s like a burning ray of hope piercing through the despair, but it’s not long before we’re reminded that one person’s happy ending is the exception and most have no such hope in sight. The details she gives of the abuse are brutal and unsparing, her delivery anything but dispassionate. Evans does not want us merely to understand what’s going on. She wants us to feel it, aching in our bones and chilling our blood. Over and over, she emphasizes that every story we hear is “somebody’s baby, somebody’s child.” And this is not some terrible thing happening out there somewhere, elsewhere, but every day, right outside these doors, and especially in Oakland. As Chase sings, Evans often rotates somberly in a kind of ritualistic dance (choreography by Anisah Abdullah). In fact, the whole play takes the form of a kind of ceremony, mourning what is and conjuring what should be, not in an abstract way but simply by focusing our minds and opening our hearts to a reality that feels awfully hard to take in. Evans’ performance is poetic, eloquent, passionate, deeply heartfelt and heartbreaking in a way that truly feels like a breaking open of all emotional armor. Evans charges us all to “learn to be the watchful keepers of one another” — to learn to see, to care and try to help. The play is only an hour long, but it’s usually followed by conversations with a variety of anti-trafficking activists and advocates, which seems more necessary here than most post-show talkbacks. Those assembled to witness this performance need to take a breath, to regroup and more than anything to learn more about what’s going on and what can be done. Evans’ “52 Letters” is a compelling performance, but it’s far more than that. It’s a vital and direct force for good.