Late-playwright Nathan Louis Jackson’s Broke-ology gets a KCRep renaissance and neighborhood tour

David Emerson, Postell Pringle, and Larry Powell in KCRep’s 2010 Production of Broke-ology. // Photo by Don Ipock

Hitting up a grocery aisle is not for the weak. Peeking at the latest price tags is a gateway to clenched teeth and white knuckles. Don’t get us started on the cost of eggs, we’re about as fragile as the shells at this point because the cost of living keeps going up, and a lot of us are getting left behind.

When local playwright Nathan Louis Jackson wrote Broke-ology back in 2007 as a student at Juilliard, the cost of living in Kansas City was climbing and the financial burdens for working-class citizens were multiplying with the recession taking form. Now nearly twenty years later, the words of the playwright who called KCK his home are as relevant as they were during the play’s 2009 debut at Lincoln Center in New York City.

Amid a distinguished career, Nathan Louis Jackson passed away in 2023, leaving behind his wife Megan Moscarro-Jackson, and their two kids, Amaya and Savion. He was an Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Playwright in Residence at KCRep who dedicated his time to working with local youth to strengthen their voice under the bright lights of the stage. He believed that the stories found in Kansas City were worth being told and that he was the man for the job.

Photo Courtesy of KCRep

Enter Broke-ology, which follows the King family, a resilient family residing in Kansas City, Kansas, who is at a crossroads. William King is battling multiple sclerosis and sons Malcolm and Ennis are faced with financial burdens and social pressures that impact their individual needs and their ability to take care of their ailing father.

Jackson’s work in Broke-ology gives us validation that struggling to find loose change in our pockets is a normal Kansas City problem, and unfortunately one of many. Add on demands from family and friends, health concerns, and stresses from work, enduring life is like operating a pressure cooker that you’ve lost the instruction manual to—there’s no guarantee it won’t explode.

Starting Feb 11, Broke-ology is getting a KCRep revival to honor the late playwright. “I am glad we get a chance to hear his voice yet again, if not in the physical of his body, but just through his written work,” says KCRep’s Associate Artistic Director Morgana Wilborn. As much as staging the play for the public is a solid “in memoriam” of the talented playwright, KCRep refuses to discount how Jackson was on a mission to make theatre accessible to all.

So, with the help of an “unofficial producer,” Nathan’s wife Megan Moscarro-Jackson, and Nathan’s friend Francois Battiste in the director’s seat, the choice was made for Broke-ology to go on tour to ten Kansas City neighborhoods to the places where Nathan frequented and where his characters William, Malcolm, and Ennis can be seen by the people they were based on.

The plan is for Broke-ology to be free and available to those with little to no access to live theatre, such as the Don Bosco Senior Center, and to visit where Nathan’s footprints can be found, such as Washington High School and Kansas City Community College where he started a drama club. Wilborn says “We not only want to engage with the Black community. We want to engage with elders. We want to engage with folks in the healthcare community.” The hope is that showcasing Jackson’s work in these spaces will allow Broke-ology’s representation of an overlooked demographic and the playwright’s memory to reach beyond the stage to the people he spent his life championing.

Photo courtesy of KCRep

Jackson’s work is meant to be heard by Kansas Citians who struggle with the price tags found in grocery aisles, those who wake up and strive for better despite being bombarded with obstacles. Scouring for affordable health care and childcare can be a harsh reminder that although the world continues to turn, and change can sometimes make its way through the rubble, some issues will forever be an uphill battle. “Welcome to the real world!” they like to say, and by “they” I mean those not crying over the cost of eggs.

But the spirit of Broke-ology is making ends meet when circumstances threaten to see otherwise. It’s about pushing through and burdening ourselves with life’s unpredictable, suffocating tasks for the sake of one’s family because it’s got to get done by someone, and that someone happens to be you.

The play is set to run Feb. 11 to March 2 at KCRep’s Copaken Stage. After the final showing, it will be taken on tour by KC Rep for All from March 6-16.

Tour Locations are listed below:

March 6 at 7 P.M.- Washington High School, Kansas City, KS

March 7 at 2 P.M.- Beatrice Lee Community Center, Kansas City, KS

March 8 at 1 P.M.- Johnson County Central Library, Overland Park, KS

March 12 at 1 P.M.- North East Branch Library, Kansas City, MO

March 13 at 6 P.M.- West Wyandotte Library- Kansas City, KS

March 14 at 6 P.M.- Bruce R. Watkins Cultural Heritage Center, Kansas City, MO

March 16 at 2 P.M.- Kansas City Community College Performing Arts Building, Kansas City, KS

Additional performances will be hosted alongside Don Bosco Senior Center, Morning Star Youth and Family Life Center, and Veteran’s Community Project.

For more information, visit KCRep’s website.