Miss Evers' Boys

On Wednesday night I went to the opening night of Miss Evers' Boys. It was an amazing performance! It was the story of four men [along with many others] who were infected with syphilis in 1932 Macon County, Alabama and their Nurse, Miss Evers, who assisted in a medical study called the “Tuskegee Study of Untreated Blacks With Syphilis”. The men were put through many vigorous forms of medication and procedures including mercurial rub, arsenic shots, painful spinal taps- which doctors called "back shots" in order to manipulate the patients to agree to going through with the procedure. They eventually quit giving them regular treatment and began using placebos, which only made things worse.

The character that I connect with the most was Willie Johnson. In my opinion, he had the most going for him before the many experiments. With his amazing dancing skills, he would have become a regular act at the Cotton Club in Harlem. Sadly, his dreams were tossed aside due to the fourteen (plus) years of painful tests and placebos in addition to the refusal of penicillin once it was discovered that it could cure his disease. This play demonstrated the struggles that face Black people in America during the days of the Great Depression. It was very frustrating and depressing for me as I watched this play. The people of Macon County were medical genie pigs who were manipulated by the government and given false hope for better and healthier lives.