When the telephone call came, Joy Jones was “surprised and thrilled.” She had already adapted her award-winning book “Tambourine Moon” for stage. Now, Oni Faida Lampley, a critically acclaimed actress and playwright, wanted to provide her own interpretation.
“She’s the kind of artist I admired. I knew it would be in good hands,” recalls Jones, a native Washingtonian. The two women first met at a D.C. Public Schools-sponsored adult education program. Their paths crossed again at the Black Women Playwrights’ staging of the “The Dark Kalamazoo.”
“It was interesting seeing that first draft, and then seeing it [again at Woolly Mammoth] as a polished production when it was touring the United States,” Jones says.
“The Dark Kalamazoo” earned Lampley a Helen Hayes Award nomination — a coveted recognition in the District’s rich theater community.
Like many other gifted artists in the city, Lampley left, finding greater opportunities and success beyond our borders in places like New York and London. She went on to win the DeComte du Nouy Award for her play “Mixed Babies.” In 2000, she was nominated for her second Charles MacArthur for “The Dark Kalamazoo.” She appeared on-screen in “Law & Order,” “The Sopranos” and “As the World Turns,” and off Broadway in “Mule Bone,” among other productions.
I met Lampley in the early 1980s, after writing my first children’s play. Carol Sullivan and the Programs for Children and Youth at the John F. Kennedy Center produced it. Lampley was a member of the ensemble of talented actors who brought my words to life.
“So often you hear someone say they are going to New York to make it big. It was an inspiration to see Oni make that transition from struggling artist to successful artist,” Jones says. “It gave me a boost when I would see her face on a billboard, in an ad or a TV show. [I’d think] ‘Yes, it’s possible because she did it.’ ”
A staged reading of Lampley’s adaptation of “Tambourine Moon” was scheduled for the spring. That won’t happen. Lampley lost her 12-year battle with cancer.
This Saturday from 4 to 7 p.m., family and friends like Jones are expected to gather for a memorial ceremony and celebration at Woolly Mammoth — Lampley’s theatrical home in D.C.
It’s not clear why Lampley fell in love with “Tambourine Moon,” which is based on stories Jones’ father told her.
“My father’s childhood was rich in ways mine was not,” says Jones, imagining the texture and warmth of rural Alabama in the 1930s compared with urban life. “I missed out on some of those grounding and transformative experiences.”
Beth Blickers of Abrams Artists Agency said Lampley kept the book at her side in the hospital. “Her 12-year-old son, Ade, read it to her regularly. It was a beautiful and peaceful sight.”
That image brings Jones and others some solace.
Jonetta Rose Barras, an author and political analyst, can be reached at [email protected].
