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“There are cross-generational conversations going on; different types of people with different monies in their pockets clashing. There are the same questions about fatherhood, about masculinity, about belonging, about the legacy of colonization coming up,” said Ellams.

“[AMOC is] opera company, part rock band, part traveling theater troupe,” Matthew Aucoin said. “It’s a collective of singers, dancers, and instrumentalists.”

Nigerian-born Inua Ellams tells host Marco Werman why the haircutter’s parlor where African men gather to beautify themselves and watch soccer is also the setting for deeply personal conversations.

“Barbershops are naturally theatrical places,” [playwright Inua] Ellams says as he watches the men in Headlines talk. “They just open up to conversation — for men to hold court and talk at length about the most ridiculous, crazy stories.”

AMOC’s open-endedness makes for an audacious, engaging residency

The banter is seemingly casual, but as the play unfolds over the course of a single day, the men discuss such issues as the relationships between fathers and sons [and] masculinity… Ellams says, “In barbershops, we can be loud and noisy. We can enjoy ourselves and express ourselves. We can be free.”