Banneker Terrace “ain’t pretty, but it’s home,” says Mimi of apartment 14D. In the opening story of Sidik Fofana’s debut collection, Stories From the Tenants Downstairs (6 hours), Mimi describes the Harlem high-rise as “one long gray-ass building, twenty-five floors, three hundred suttin apartments.” The laundry machines don’t work, and the trash chute smells. But the people of Banneker Terrace are marvelous to behold, brought to memorable life by a talented cast of stage, television and voice actors.
Fofana reads the poetic “Intro,” then Joniece Abbott-Pratt, Nile Bullock, Dominic Hoffman, DePre Owens, André Santana, Bahni Turpin and Jade Wheeler voice the book’s eight stories, weaving together the tenants’ deeply personal tales and highlighting their individual struggles, fears and hopes.
Fofana’s intimate, unfiltered stories are powerful enough on the page, but they’re gloriously amplified by these performers.