Pittsburgh’s North Side is ready for its close-up, as outdoor filming of August Wilson’s “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” is in full swing.
West North Avenue exteriors, between Brighton Road and Galveston Avenue, have been repainted, restructured and decorated with props to resemble Chicago, circa 1927, outside the recording studio where Ma Rainey’s presence is anticipated by her session musicians.
On Tuesday morning, the street was lined with vintage cars awaiting the filming of a scene that in the play is only described, but not seen. When Ma Rainey — Oscar winner Viola Davis in the film — makes her entrance into the recording studio, she is accompanied by her nephew Sylvester (Dusan Brown), her lover Dussie Mae (Taylour Paige) and a policeman, who is threatening to arrest her for an altercation with a cab driver as she tried to flee the scene.
At 10:30 a.m., sitting by himself on a stoop as cars from the era were being moved into place, was George C. Wolfe, the director of this Netflix project. Wolfe is a 10-time Tony Award nominee and a winner for producing “Take Me Out,” in 2003.
He was watching as actors and crew members were arriving from just-completed filming on Brighton Road, while others had been waiting their turn on North Avenue.
Rick Stamerra, of White Oak, was standing on the steps outside the Flashlight Factory, where extras in 1920s garb were waiting for the principal actors in the car accident scene. He is the owner of Stamerra Plumbing & Heating when he isn’t on local stages, chasing his dream of acting.
Stamerra said his job in the scene would be as a bystander “looking with disdain” at a black woman arguing with a police officer.
The recording studio interior scenes for “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” which also stars Chadwick Boseman (“Black Panther,” “42”), are set for the 31st Street Studios in the Strip District. The production also applied for a permit to film in Deer Lakes Park, north of the city with acreage in Frazer and West Deer townships.
“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” was the second play written by Pittsburgh native August Wilson and the first of his 10 American Century Cycle plays to make it to Broadway. It is the second Denzel Washington-produced movie of a Wilson play — the Oscar-nominated “Fences” came first — to be filmed in the childhood home of the Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright.
Sharon Eberson: seberson@post-gazette.com or 412-263-1960. Twitter: @SEberson_pg.
First Published: July 9, 2019, 5:01 p.m.