Fat Ham

Common Thread Theatre Collective is back for the summer with an extremely funny, audacious southern retelling of Shakespeare's classic tragedy Hamlet, titled Fat Ham

Common Thread Theatre Collective (CTTC), a collaboration between Davidson College and North Carolina A&T State University (NC A&T), is pleased to announce its third season of summer productions. Continuing with a mission to produce theatre by and about traditionally underrepresented communities, this season CTTC will produce the Pulitzer-Prize winning play by North Carolina native James Ijames, Fat Ham, directed by Xulee Vanecia J, NC A&T Theatre Professor. The play will take place in June 2024, in the Barber Theatre on the campus of Davidson College in Davidson, NC. This season will mark the first performances by CTTC in Greensboro at the Paul Robeson Theatre on NC A&T’s campus.

Award-winning playwright Ijames reinvents Shakespeare’s masterpiece Hamlet as a delectable comedic tragedy. The lead character Juicy is a queer, Southern college student, already grappling with some serious questions of identity, when the ghost of his father shows up in their backyard, demanding that Juicy avenge his murder. It feels like a familiar story to Juicy, who is well-versed in Hamlet’s woes. What’s different is Juicy himself, a sensitive and self-aware young Black man is trying to break the cycles of trauma and violence in service of his own liberation. From an uproarious family barbecue emerges a compelling examination of love, loss, pain, and joy.