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The Negro Ensemble Company production of Ceremonies in Dark Old Men opened at the St. Marks Playhouse, New York City, on February 4, 1969, with the following cast:

MR. RUSSELL B. PARKER | DOUGLAS TURNER
MR. WILLIAM JENKINS | ARTHUR FRENCH
THEOPOLIS PARKER | WILLIAM JAY
BOBBY PARKER | DAVID DOWNING
ADELE ELOISE PARKER | ROSALIND CASH
BLUE HAVEN | SAMUEL BLUE, JR.
YOUNG GIRL | JUDYANN ELDER
Directed by Edmund Cambridge

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Early spring, about 4:30 in the afternoon, now. A small, poverty-stricken barbershop on 126th Street between Seventh and Lenox avenues, Harlem, U.S.A.

There is only one barber's throne in this barbershop. There is a not too lengthy mirror along the wall, and a high, broad shelf in the immediate area of the throne. There are two decks of shelves of equal width projecting just below the main shelf. These shelves are covered by small, sliding panels. On the far left corner is a door leading to a back room. Just to the right of the door, flush against the wall, is a card table and two chars. Farther right is a clothes rack. Against the wall to the far left of the shop, near the door, are four chairs lined up uniformly.

The back room is like any back room in a poverty-stricken barbershop. It has an old refrigerator, an even older antique-type desk, and a medium-size bed. On the far right is a short flight of stairs leading up. A unique thing about this room: a door to stairs coming up from a small basement.

The action of the play takes place in the barbershop and back room.