Now, at 22, Mabry stars in the Alliance Theatre production of “Fat Ham,” running through May 12. They said they cannot wait for hometown audiences to experience the play, which reimagines William Shakespeare’s “Hamlet” at a Southern family barbecue.
“I’m so ready to do this for Atlanta audiences; I’m so, so so ready,” Mabry said. “The theater that we’re playing is the Hertz Stage, and I was a teen ensemble member at the Alliance. The summer I turned 16 was the first year I was there, and I have seen more plays in that theater than anywhere else in the world. So for me — oh, I don’t want to cry — playing on that stage is sacred.”
Mabry grew up in Fayetteville and Fairburn — at one point serving as a theater critic for ArtsATL — before going to college in Boston for years and traveling the country as a professional actor. Mabry is also the youngest performer to speak onstage at TedxBroadway, delivering a speech about the impact Shakespeare’s works can have upon African American youth.
The Alliance Theatre had a profound effect upon Mabry, who trained with its now-artistic directors, Christopher Moses and Tinashe Kajese-Bolden, as a teen.
“It’s really crazy to be in a place that’s been my sanctuary for so long,” Mabry said. “I can fully say that if I hadn’t seen ‘Seize the King’ at the Alliance, I wouldn’t have explored Shakespeare the way I have. I wouldn’t be able to play Juicy. The Alliance’s programming and its education have literally impacted every way I’ve moved as an artist. Getting to come back to Atlanta now, at 22, in my equity principal debut in my home theater — in the theater that literally changed me molecularly as a young artist — this is a moment in my life that I know I’m going to be talking about forever.”
In “Fat Ham,” Juicy is visited by the ghost of his father and is told to avenge his death at a barbecue celebrating his mother’s marriage to his uncle. The characters in the…
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