By Mike Napolitano

The Pin Points Theatre, a theatre company based in Washington, D.C., spread its message of empowerment with a performance of “1,001 Black Inventions” at Northeastern Tuesday.

The production, sponsored by the Northeastern Black Student Association (NBSA) and the Black Engineering Student Society (BESS), featured the lives of black men and women by highlighting important inventions by people of African descent. Four performers depicted what life would be like without many of the vital innovations from the past few centuries.

“I chose this because it fit the theme we wanted to express,” said Tiffany Malcolm, NBSA vice president.

Pin Points Theatre was founded by Ersky Freeman 20 years ago. Inspired by the belief that theatre should be enlightening as well as entertaining, Freeman has written plays like “No Dressing,” “Kiamsha” and “Hooked On Love.” With topics ranging from stress to the science of relationships, the company has performed in Canada, Guam, Japan, Singapore and the United States.

The show opened with the performers listing many everyday things that were invented by African Americans. Fountain pens, coffee, boomerangs and aspirin were named as the actors mimed a machine of some sort in amusing harmony.

The next scene featured a middle-aged man who appeared to have a heart attack. His wife, rushing to his aid, explained that everything would be OK because of the accomplishments of Daniel Hale Williams.

“I’ll just go and call an ambulance now,” she said casually. In the 1850s, Williams completed the first successful open heart surgery that would later lead to greater innovations in the medical field.

The scene ended as all four performers took the stage to express a message to the audience. The youngest, Suzanne Edgar, said society often represents African-Americans as entertainers, athletes or bums. Intellectual achievement, she said, is something that often goes unnoticed.

A bum was introduced as Jan Matzeliger, a South American of African descent who invented a machine to mass produce shoes in the late 1800s. Matzeliger was depicted as an underappreciated genius, even after revolutionizing the shoe industry and bringing in millions of dollars for the companies that adopted his machine. The skit echoed the message of the entire play: many black achievements have gone unnoticed throughout history.

The play also interpreted the life of George Washington Carver. In the play, Carver was put on trial for being a witch, with the prosecution claiming there was no way he could have achieved all he had without the help of the devil. The lawyer on the defense proceeded to describe all that Carver did, from teaching at the Tuskegee Institute to discovering more than 300 uses for the peanut.

Black women were highlighted next, as the performers identified their advancements in thermodynamics, rocket science, long distance calls, the ironing board and jazz. A humorous skit in which a man came home to have dinner with his wife and children was used to show how many things are taken for granted daily come from African Americans.

The finale of the play comes when the scene starts over in a “Twilight Zone” manner where all these inventions are missing and only the father remembers they existed, to further drive home the point.

When the daughter pulled out a sundial to tell the time, her father said, “Use your watch!” The daughter, oblivious to the basic invention, responded, “I am watching!” as she surveyed the land for light. The actors employed many humorous touches like this to help make their point.

More information on Pin Points Theatre can be found on its website, www.pinpoints.org.