When adapting the works of celebrated playwright August Wilson, you’d be hard-pressed to find someone as studied in the subject as Ruben Santiago-Hudson.
Throughout his 45-year career, Santiago-Hudson has either produced, directed, or acted in all of Wilson’s plays, which has earned him a Tony nomination (Best Direction of a Play for 2017’s production of Jitney) and a win (Best Featured Actor in a Play for 1996’s Seven Guitars). To boot, Santiago-Hudson was also fortunate to call Wilson a friend for more than two decades before the playwright died in 2005.
“Many people feel that I’m one of the preeminent interpreters of his work,” Santiago-Hudson says. “Through our extraordinary conversations, I understood his philosophies and the way that he thought and things that were important to him.”
So it’s little surprise Santiago-Hudson was tapped to adapt Wilson’s 1984 play Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom into a screenplay.
Directed by George C. Wolfe, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom stars Viola Davis as the titular pioneering blues singer. Over the course of a recording session with her band at the height of her career, tensions rise to a fever pitch as the talented, yet volatile, trumpet player Levee (Chadwick Boseman) becomes a point of contention for everyone, leading to devastating consequences.
Characteristically of Wilson’s work, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom lays bare the simple joys and complex pains of the Black American experience, which Santiago-Hudson, of course, wanted to amplify to its fullest. He just had to figure out how to do it his way, particularly in the context of Black America today.
“The first August Wilson play that I saw in 1984 was Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom at Cort Theatre on Broadway—and then here it comes full circle,” Santiago-Hudson says. “So instead of the young man that was sitting on the stairs in 1984, sneaking into the theater to watch it, I’m the man that’s empowered to translate that incredible moment in my life to the larger moment in the world’s life.”
“Everything is not sacred”
“One of my rules as a writer is that everything is not sacred, which goes totally against what I think about August’s work, because I think all of it is sacred,” Santiago-Hudson says. “So I had to treat August the way that I treat my own writing. And I had to figure out what story I’m trying to tell.”
What Santiago-Hudson landed on were subtle tweaks to Wilson’s work that empowered the characters and their decisions more so than in the source material.
For example, in the play, Ma’s manager Irvin and the recording studio owner Sturdyvant, two white men, have a conversation about the financial power of Black music. But in the film version, that dialogue lands among Levee and the rest of the band.
“I let the brother have the knowledge,” Santiago-Hudson says. “I empowered Levee with knowledge about the music industry.”
Santiago-Hudson also fleshed out the somewhat bit character Dussie Mae, Ma’s love interest. Part of the tension that mounts throughout the play and film stems from Levee and Dussie Mae’s incessant flirting despite him knowing she’s with Ma. In the play, Levee and Dussie Mae share just a clandestine kiss. However, Santiago-Hudson wanted to dial up the sexual release in the scene in a way that spotlights Dussie Mae’s agency.
“When I was writing it, George was saying, ‘Are they going to . . . .? And I said, ‘Hell yeah, they’re gonna do that.’ I wanted to empower the woman,” Santiago-Hudson says. “I didn’t want Dussie Mae to be some silly little girl that’s following around Ma. I wanted Dussie Mae to be smart and cunning. She doesn’t have a tremendous amount of lines. I empowered her by making her take over in that scene. When she decided to take his little butt, she was taking it.”
Even with Ma, a character who may not seem like she could be more empowered than she is, Santiago-Hudson was deliberate in opening the film showing Ma in full force.
“Ma Rainey comes in on page 48 of 102-page play. You know, when she comes in in my movie? Page one,” Santiago-Hudson says. “The first thing you hear is her moaning. And the next thing you know, we cut into her glory [performing on stage in a tent]. That’s where she was most powerful. Those hundred recordings that she had at Paramount Records between 1923 and 1927 wasn’t where she was most powerful. It was in the tent.”
In a way, those small moments of Black empowerment Santiago-Hudson added underscore one of the play’s themes of how unfairly Black culture is commodified by white power structures in backward deals, if a deal exists at all. It’s something Santiago-Hudson has had to contend with in his own career.
“My integrity is not for sale”
“I want Black folks to take a look at this and see what these white people are doing when they take, take, take from us and turn it into their wealth,” Santiago-Hudson says. “Certain things have no price with me. My integrity is not for sale.”
Santiago-Hudson recalls a time when he was shopping around a miniseries based on the Harlem Renaissance. He pitched it around to a streaming service and a network, and there was definite interest—with the caveat that it would be a movie instead.
“I cannot tell this story in two hours,” Santiago-Hudson says. “Roots has been done twice, but you can’t do the Harlem Renaissance once? You could do [a miniseries] when we were slaves, about how we survived and strived and thrived through all that demolition of our character and the looting and pillaging of our culture, but not when we were kings and queens [in the Harlem Renaissance]?”
“You could see the look in their eyes like, ‘Get him outta here,’” Santiago-Hudson recalls. “If they had a bouncer, you would’ve heard my ass hitting the floor.”
Working on a film like Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom is more than an obligation stemming from how close Santiago-Hudson was to Wilson: It’s the kind of story he wants to help usher in for a new generation. “Those stories that show us as whole, complete human beings with all the frailties and power and magnificence and anger and pathos and pain and laughter that everybody else gets to show.
“There’s no other thing that I love more than telling the whole real stories about my people and all their glory,” Santiago-Hudson says. “Other than my family, it’s the primary thing in my life: telling our stories and making us whole and complete.”
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Citi’s CEO, Michael Corbat, thinks productivity may suffer with long-term remote work. Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg anticipates as much as half of Facebook’s employees will transition to working remotely over the next five to 10 years. Netflix’s Reed Hastings believes working from home is “a pure negative.”
Over the past nine-plus months, just about every major CEO has declared remote work the new way of the world, a necessary evil, or—less frequently—somewhere in between. And it’s not just CEOs. Since the start of the pandemic, my inbox has been filled with contributed pieces from thought leaders and experts which can generally fall into one of two categories: A) Why we can’t wait to go back to the office after the pandemic, or B) Why we’re never in a million years going back to the office post-pandemic.
These strong opinions make sense. For individual workers, March’s sudden transition meant figuring out Zoom etiquette (and Zoom fatigue), wondering what happened to that “extra” time now that you don’t have a commute, and what to do when your kid or dog interrupts your meeting for the fourth time. For managers overseeing disparate teams, sometimes across time zones, this change has provided its own challenges.
Add in the fact that every worker has their own remote work set up, tools, preferences for collaboration, and tolerance for troubleshooting tech, and it’s no wonder we all feel differently. Some love the flexibility that working from home provides, while others miss their quiet cubicles, running into their coworkers in the communal kitchen, or just having a real reason to get dressed each morning.
The data suggests that even once it’s safe again to go back to an in-person work environment, plenty of employees won’t be rushing to return to 9-5s at their office desks. In a recent report by ManpowerGroup, most of the workers surveyed said they’d prefer working two to three days in an office, and working remotely the rest of the time.
Which brings us to that sticky question of productivity—surely the lion’s share of the calculation that Hastings, Zuckerberg, or any CEO, is making. Can employees get as much done while working from their kitchen table?
The short answer seems to be “yes.” Mercer surveyed 800 employers and 94% said that productivity was unaffected—or even improved—compared to its pre-pandemic levels.
But it’s not that simple, of course. Quality matters, too. Leaders from across industries have agonized about the other intangible factors affecting remote teams. What do video meetings mean for creative brainstorming and innovation? How can you preserve company culture when you only see your coworkers in rectangular boxes on your screen? What does it mean for employee mental health when the only thing separating “work” and “life” is whether you’re using your company-provided laptop, or your personal one?
Unsurprisingly, these factors are harder to quantify. But a few things are already clear about this huge work-from-home experiment we’ve embarked on:
There isn’t one version of remote work
Unlike the Buffers or GitLabs of the world, most companies were thrust into the work from home game suddenly, when the world started to shut down in mid-March. Teams first had to figure out the practical logistics (selecting video conferencing tools, distributing work laptops, etc.) before even beginning to think about more theoretical concerns. So working remotely at some companies meant just trying to replicate the type of activities that usually happened in-office. But at other institutions that were further along, leaders were focused on building a successful culture where employees felt connected and empowered to do creative work.
When I spoke with Sid Sijbrandij, GitLab’s CEO, back in March, just as many companies were first making the transition, he was quick to point out that “working remotely” didn’t look the same across all companies. “We’re trying to do our part in teaching the world, ‘Hey, remote is more than just using Slack and Zoom,’” he told me.
Successful remote teams often require restructuring—and support
Many companies that have decided to invest in remote work long-term have realized that it requires leadership to make a genuine investment to succeed. That includes articulating clear goals and values—and setting an example about how remote work should look. Creating an environment where employees remain engaged is not an undertaking that mid-level managers can solve by holding more frequent check-ins with direct reports.
In fact, more frequent check-ins and micromanaging is generally the wrong approach when trying to build a productive remote team, say experts. Instead, managers should prioritize results over hours logged. “What if you had an organization that could eliminate most layers of management?” writes remote work expert and former CEO of Optiva Danielle Royston. “Start to think about what changes to your business processes you’d have to make so that employees could work with zero management overhead.”
One thing that a number of tech companies, including Facebook, are increasingly opting for: Hiring a head of remote work. The position is intended to help create a cohesive experience for all workers, says Brynn Harrington, vice president of people growth at Facebook. “We’re looking for the person with influence, skills, and experience who can help us pivot the company. When we think about the transformation to remote, it’s a wholesale shift in how we run.”
It’s a recent shift. A report from T3 Advisors of 95 tech companies found that only 2% had a designated leader to oversee remote work in August 2020, but that number had climbed to 12% by November 2020.
More flexibility is great, but it doesn’t solve fundamental problems
One of the biggest perks touted by remote work evangelists is the flexibility it provides. Need to be home for the plumber, or because your kid is sick? Not a problem. Need to take your dog for a 3 p.m. walk? Now you can. And for teams that work asynchronously, workers have even more options—a boon for night owls, midday exercisers, or anyone who appreciates being trusted to get their work done when it’s most convenient for them.
But while flexibility can be helpful for working parents—especially mothers, who often shoulder the majority of caretaking responsibilities—it’s dangerous to think of it as a solution to the underlying caregiving crisis playing out in homes across the country.
Parents have been largely left to their own devices during the pandemic, cut off from much of the childcare support they once relied upon. Sure, some companies have extended flexible leave for working white-collar parents, allowed them to shift or reduce their hours, or offered additional perks and benefits.
But while being allowed to work from home is a privilege that many lack, juggling full-time work, plus supervising remote learning is untenable for months on end. So it’s no wonder many are dropping out. According to the Labor department, in September, 865,000 women left the workforce. That more than four times the number of men.
“Working mothers don’t need bike shares,” writes senior staff writer Ainsley Harris. “They certainly don’t need magic shows. They need their companies to act as better corporate citizens and advocate for policies that address the daily needs of parents across the payroll spectrum.”
Until substantive changes are made to provide families affordable childcare, women will continue to be left out. “We’re already seeing and will continue to see fundamental rollbacks in women’s gains in the workforce—in earnings, promotions, and leadership,” Katherine Eyster, the director of strategic partnerships and policy initiatives at the National Partnership for Women and Families, told staff writer Pavithra Mohan back in August.
It’s a significant cost—and not just for the women and their families. Companies will miss out, too. And, while it may be easier to see who is missing when you’re all sitting around an office conference table and not on a Zoom call, make no mistake: Remote work isn’t a success unless it works for everyone.
This article is part of Fast Company’s Lessons of COVID-19 package, exploring some of the ways America has changed since the pandemic hit and what we have learned from it. Click here to read the entire series.
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