by Audrey Liebross

Green Room Theatre Company’s last production of the 2023-24 season is a series of readings titled Displacement Stories from Section 14. This is a very emotional play to watch, because it deals with the destruction of numerous, mostly Black and Brown lives, all Palm Springs residents who became homeless when the city burned their houses, most with all their possessions inside. The houses were rentals located on what was known as section 14 of land owned by the Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians.

Displacement, which is a devised play based on historical research into city documents by playwrights Allison Jaye and Jerome Joseph Gentes, as well as by Green Room Artistic Director David Catanzarite and the actors, describes the events in detail. According to Green Room’s Web site, the play is a “fictionalized account of events from 1923 to 1973 based on public records.”

Mr. Catanzarite explained that his hope is to obtain funding that will allow the company to produce a full-fledged play about the debacle that led to the destruction of the busy neighborhood, mostly in the 1960’s. The purpose of razing the neighborhood was to allow building the Agua Caliente casino and other new structures near downtown Palm Springs. Because negotiations are ongoing between the city and the survivors of the evictions, it is easy to find news stories, including in major East Coast publications, that describe the historical events.

Even though it is Phase 1 of a work in progress, as Mr. Catanzarite describes the production, this play is a must-see for anyone that cares about what is probably the biggest racial justice issue in Palm Springs’ history. Some of the actors are survivors of the infernos, and it is sobering to hear about what befell our fellow local residents fifty or sixty years ago. Nonetheless, the script definitely conveys more than just sadness and anger; there is quite a bit of humor, some of it satirizing the racists who crossed paths with the Native Americans, such as a honeymooning white couple who can’t understand why the fellow running the gas station doesn’t wear a feathered headdress, and other scenes conveying the humorous aspects of family life.

One of my favorite stories in the play is that of a family with two little boys. Alvin Taylor plays the five-year-old brother. Mr. Taylor, who has served as a spokesperson for a section 14 survivors’ group, learned to play the drums as a child in the neighborhood. He later went on to be a world-class drummer with a star on the Palm Springs Walk of Fame. Eddie Stephens, familiar to many local audiences, brilliantly plays his nine-year-old big brother who tries to get the little one to act more mature. What sibling cannot relate to that?

What happened to the residents is indeed harrowing. Some of them got eviction notices because of the city’s decision to develop the area, but the others apparently did not — one of the disputes going on to this day. In any event, no one appears to have been notified when their house was slated for demolition, because despite warnings from the construction company’s employees about occupied houses, the higher-ups in the company either believed or wanted to believe that all the houses were vacant. As a result, resident after resident came home to find their houses aflame, with all their belongings inside. Some of them managed to move in with neighbors whose houses had not yet been destroyed, and others moved to Lawrence Crossley’s property, a well-off Black man who made his land available to the newly homeless residents of section 14. But even those who could afford to start over had problems finding nearby places to live, because restrictive covenants and generalized racial discrimination (yes, in Southern California, in the mid-20th century) kept them from finding new homes in what the readings characterize as the white peoples’ playground.

I do not review readings in detail when they are early manifestations of works in progress, although I’m happy to offer suggestions about ways to help a script come alive for audiences, and to give shout-outs regarding especially terrific performances. The approach taken by the playwrights is to emphasize the heartache that the decision to destroy the neighborhood caused; as the characters who are displaced residents note, this was their home, and they loved the neighborhood, which was also home to numerous successful stores and restaurants. The residents were poor, but happy. Yet, the story about a neighborhood of rental properties seems unlikely to resonate with today’s audiences, even with the play’s frequent assertion that it was home.

Some of the actors who survived the events in question discussed the drug and alcohol problems that occurred much later, probably because of the trauma. I’d like to see more about the anguish that the residents experienced, not only because of the evictions and fires themselves, but because they undoubtedly felt powerless to fight back.

Also, while the script makes clear that the tribal elders (all women) worried about what would befall the renters, they had to do what was right for the people they governed. Development was certainly good for the tribe, economically. Also, while the play cleared up my previous confusion about what exactly happened, I still have some major questions: While the scenery projections show the interiors of comfortable homes, are the projections historically accurate? Many published photographs show exteriors of shamefully substandard housing in which people should not have been relegated to living. If the houses were indeed often ramshackle, development, had it proceeded fairly — a huge “if” — could have provided sturdy, low-cost housing for people whose choices were limited. The same could have happened if the city had compensated the residents fairly for their displacement. I’d like to see the play address these issues in greater detail as among the ways in which the city failed the residents.

In any event, Displacement Stories from Section 14 is a not-to-be-missed piece of theatre. It will run for another weekend, from June 28th through 30th at the Coachella Library Community Room, 1500 6th Street, in Coachella. Performances are Friday, June 28th and Saturday, June 29th, at 6:30 p.m., and Saturday, June 29th and Sunday, June 30th, at 2:00 p.m. Tickets and more information are available on the Web site, at grtccv.org. Provision will be made for low or no-cost tickets for those who need them.