INTERACT THEATRE COMPANY

Following on the success of Bee-Luther-Hatchee and Permanent Collection, A House With No Walls presents a conflict between two African Americans - a rising star in the world of academia who has just published a startlingly conservative book and an ultra-liberal, Afro-centric political activist. The battleground for these two opposing forces is the site of the new American Museum of Liberty, which happens to be on the grounds of George Washington’s Philadelphia home, including its slave quarters. This dramatic controversy - inspired by real-life events in Philadelphia - serves as a springboard for a volatile debate over whether or not African Americans should embrace the legacy of slavery as their primary identity or discard it as a mantle of "victimhood." A House With No Walls juxtaposes the fictionalized present day conflict with the true story of one of George Washington’s slaves as she contemplates escape.

Thomas Gibbons is the recipient of a Pew Fellowship in the Arts, a six-time recipient of the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts’ Playwriting Fellowships, and winner of a Roger S. Stevens Award, a Barrie and Bernice Stavis Playwriting Award, and a Barrymore Award for Outstanding New Play.