The Star of ‘The Oval’ Directs His Own Work for Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company
By SHARON EBERSON
Even with rehearsals underway, Javon Johnson is still surprised that Sanctified is making its first appearance on a Pittsburgh stage.
He chalks up Sanctified making its local debut, courtesy of Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company, to timing and a call from his friend, company leader Mark Clayton Southers.
The show won six Black Theatre Alliance Awards back in 2009 and has had several well-received productions on its way to Madison Arts Center, PPTC’s home in the Upper Hill District.
On a rain-soaked February day last week, Johnson sat in the quiet and warmth of an office at the center, discussing Sanctified, his ties to Pittsburgh, and his screen career, including six seasons on the BET TV series The Oval.
Johnson is directing his own musical play about generations of church-goers and the sounds that speak to their souls. The timing may be right, but it isn’t necessarily easy for Johnson, who has been traveling back and forth from New Orleans, where his production company is filming The Stuttering Preacher, with Johnson as director and star.
His 2024 film Once in a Valentine is available on Starz, and he has appeared in movies such as Barbershop 2 and The Hate U Give. However, Johnson is perhaps best known as The White House butler Richard Hallsen on Tyler Perry’s The Oval.
The South Carolina native’s attachment to the city’s theater community dates to working toward his MFA at the University of Pittsburgh, where he was swept under the wing of Dr. Vernell Lillie, a pioneer of Black theater and the cofounder of Kuntu Rep, where she served as artistic director. Among the artists nurtured by Dr. Lillie were Johnson, Southers, Monteze Freeland and Pulitzer Prize-winning Pittsburgh native August Wilson.
Johnson has previously returned to Pittsburgh theater in recent years for fellow Pitt alum Patrick Jordan’s barebones productions, in 2017 to star in The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity, and in 2023, to direct Is God Is. Among other local roles, he has starred as Othello for Pittsburgh Irish & Classical Theatre, and was Asagai in A Raisin in the Sun, a coproduction of City Theatre and Kuntu Repertory Theatre. He returned to Pittsburgh Public Theater last year as a judge for the National August Wilson New Voices Competition.
“I’m always trying to find a reason to get here and do work,” Johnson said, “because the beginning phases of me really becoming an artist happened in Pittsburgh. I was aspiring before I got here. But then when I got here, I really started to develop and to say, ‘This is what I really want to do.’ ”
The inspiration for Sanctified goes further back, to growing up in a South Carolina town and attending what he described as a small family church, with 30-to-40 parishioners.
“And then over the course of time, it dwindled down to maybe 15 or less,” Johnson said, noting that what it lacked was young worshippers.
Pastors came and went for a time, he said, including one in his 30s who was met with resistance from the old guard.
“I looked at that, and I said, ‘There’s something to be explored here in the church.’ Sometimes tradition can hold steadfast so hard, that nobody budges. What concerned me, what really sparked the idea [for Sanctified], was when I saw that the youth were no longer present.”
Johnson’s work explores the generational divide with plenty of humor and music, and “the ideas of different genres in the church and the politics around that,” using traditional hymns and music ranging from gospel to R&B to hip-hop to opera.
Sanctified follows what happens when a traditional Black church re-examines its old ways and listens to the youthful voices it was inclined to shut down.
“That’s at the heart of the conflict,” Johnson said.
Ultimately, Sanctified is about how an open mind can lead to a path that benefits worshippers of all ages.
“Everything needs to evolve. And so that’s really what I want people to take away, along with different generations, different perspectives, different voices,” Johnson said.
As he talked, some of those voices were already warming up in Madison’s Carter Redwood Theater.
The cast of Pittsburgh Playwrights’ Sanctified comprises Katy Cotten, Emir J. Hardy, Mils James, Marissa Lily, Sam Lothardm Brenda Marks, Karla C. Payne, Charles Timbers, Cheryl El Walker, Manny Walker and Dion Westbrook.
Before it was time to head to rehearsal, Johnson patiently answered questions about The Oval and the inspirational aura of Tyler Perry, who among other things has made Atlanta a movie and TV mecca, with one of the largest production facilities in the world.
“I think it’s phenomenal what he’s done, and he has changed a lot of lives, just by bringing people to the table. So he’s very inspiring,” Johnson said. “And the way that he did it … took a lot of independent movement, and believing in what he believed in, and putting forth all the efforts to see his vision through while staying in a position of control – that’s not easy in this industry.”
The Oval is a political drama following a fictional White House staff and interracial First Family, with a president who has touted strong values, while “his family unit is far from strong, and abhorrently absent of any values or virtue.”
The TV series portrays power grabs, infidelity, corruption and scandal, which prompted the question: Is truth stranger than The Oval’s fiction?
“At some point, maybe if you did this show 20 years ago, it would maybe be unbelievable, right? But now? You’re like, it’s not so farfetched,” Johnson replied.
As he headed toward the theater of the Madison Arts Center, a former elementary school being revitalized by Southers & Co., Johnson looked back to the days when Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company wasn’t yet a dream.
“You’ve got to think back to when none of this existed for him or us at the time,” Johnson said. “And then to see it become a reality, it’s wonderful, because at the time when I met Mark, I don’t think any of this was in his psyche. … It takes strong belief and commitment, even when you don’t always have the support or have people believing in you. But you can see, if you commit, the community will come.”
It’s that kind of commitment that keeps Johnson coming back to the place that helped launch his career, and this time, he’s bringing a work of his own, for its long awaited introduction to Pittsburgh audiences.
TICKETS AND DETAILS
Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company’s production of Sanctified runs March 8 – 30, 2025, at Madison Arts Center, 3401 Milwaukee Street, Upper Hill District. Tickets: https://www.pghplaywrights.org/season-info/sanctified/sanctified-tickets/
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