- [Announcer] Coming up on One Detroit," we'll share the true story behind Detroit Public Theatre's new play titled "Here There are Blueberries."

Plus we'll have the story of one woman's health battle and how it became an opportunity to help African American women.

Also ahead in our Destination Detroit series, a southwest Detroit resident shares how we came to the city from Honduras.

And we'll close the show with a performance by Detroit's own Wendell Harrison.

It's all coming up next on "One Detroit."

- [Narrator] Across our MASCO family of companies, our goal is to deliver better living possibilities and make positive changes in the neighborhoods where we live, work, and do business.

MASCO, a Michigan company since 1929.

Support also provided by the Cynthia and Edsel Ford Fund for Journalism at Detroit PBS.

- [Announcer] The DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit PBS.

Through our giving, we are committed to meeting the needs of the communities we serve statewide to help ensure a bright and thriving future for all.

Learn more at DTEFoundation.com.

- [Narrator] Nissan Foundation and viewers like you (dramatic music) - [Announcer] Just ahead on "One Detroit," we'll hear how one woman's breast cancer diagnosis served as a call to action for black women to take control of their health.

Plus our Destination Detroit series introduces us to a Detroiter whose arrival in the city connected him to multiple cultures.

And we'll have a performance by Detroit jazz musician Wendell Harrison from this year's Concert of Colors.

But first up, Detroit Public Theatre has opened its new season with the play "Here There are Blueberries."

The production tells the true story of a photograph album donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in 2007.

It was filled with pictures of Nazi officers at a concentration camp taking part in everyday activities.

The play follows the museum curators as they examine the history and impact of the photos.

"One Detroit's" Chris Jordan attended a rehearsal and talked with members of the cast and crew.

- No one but me has identified.

- No one.

- If more Nazi descendants like you would be willing to speak to us, it would be hugely helpful.

But-- - But you're a Holocaust museum.

- Exactly.

- [Chris] A classroom at Mosaic Youth Theatre in Detroit, mid-September, Detroit Public Theatre is rehearsing for their fall play.

- "Here There are Blueberries" is a play based on an album of photographs.

This album of photographs was donated to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

And when they opened it, they saw that it was just the perpetrators of the Holocaust, sort of chilling.

Most of the time, they're not really doing their job at Auschwitz.

You see them hanging out at a sort of resort.

You see them hanging out with the young women who were the secretaries.

And so when this album was donated to the museum, it did something to people.

It really saw the quotidian sort of daily life nature of what it was to be a perpetrator of the Holocaust.

And we at Tectonic Theater Project felt that feeling, and we said is there a play here?

- I had the pleasure of seeing "Here There are Blueberries" in New York at New York Theatre Workshop.

And my first thought was what a dream it would be to bring this play to Michigan, to Detroit, to Detroit Public Theatre.

- [Chris] Sarah Winkler is one of the producing artistic directors at Detroit Public Theatre.

- Tectonic said to us, we would be okay with allowing you to be the first theater in the States that is not us to produce this play.

So Detroit Public Theatre and Detroit gets to see the first licensed production of "Here There are Blueberries," and it's really a deep partnership because Amy came, you know, an artist who helped build this piece over nearly a decade.

- Director Amy Marie Seidel was part of the original team who created the play at Tectonic Theater Project in New York.

- We created this play with all of the elements of the stage in mind from the beginning.

And one of the super important parts of that were the images.

We knew that the core of the narrative of this piece was gonna be told in the images themselves.

And so it asked the question, how do you tell a play through an album of photographs and make it theatrical?

- But it's really the second part of the sequence with the women that stands out the most.

It's this page.

The caption says, "Hier gibt es blaubeeren," here there are blueberries.

People called us and said these people look normal.

These girls look like teenage girls because they were.

One caller even said I know I never could have been a Mengele.

I know I never could have been a Hucker, but could I have been a Helfer?

- Cheryl Turski plays the real life archivist who worked with the photo album to uncover its history and who was interviewed extensively by Tectonic Theater Project to develop the play.

- She's being faced with these questions that she didn't ever think she would really have to ask herself, such as like, oh, I am similar to some of the women depicted in the album in terms of age or where I was in my life.

And I am now asking this question of what I would've done at that time.

- So what did they actually know?

- Most of what you're seeing in "Here There are Blueberries," is based on interviews that we did.

So we interviewed historians, we interviewed experts.

We went to Poland and Germany, and we interviewed the children and grandchildren of the high powered Nazis depicted in the album.

And for me, when I was at those interviews in Germany, looking into the eyes of the people who don't have the luxury of distance, something shifted for me.

I watched a man in his 80s grapple with a loving father who was both warm and culpable in terms of genocide.

And most of us, I think, especially in the United States, we have the luxury of distance from the perpetrators of this event.

But those people did not have that luxury.

And so looking in the eyes of those people who were grappling with that warm father who was also the culpable Nazi, I think is at the heart of this play.

- So you feel that your father, he had a conscience.

- Yes, of course he had a conscience.

- So you've come to terms with his participation?

- No.

- No?

- Absolutely not.

- This is a play about history, and yet the lens of history allows us to reflect on the present day and on what we dream of for the future.

There's a beautiful restraint to the storytelling in this piece that really allows you to enter the story without, without judgment and allows you to really, really reflect on yourself and what your responsibility is to society and what your responsibility to history is.

- We translate experience into knowledge.

And I think that the play is doing that.

It's translating these experiences into knowledge for the audience.

- There are moments when these images take over the stage, and there's nothing like being in the audience and having the images take over the stage.

You're confronted with them in an entirely different way than I think you are in a museum or in a film documentary.

Having a collective experience like that with these images, I think it's able to do something quite special.

- They were 11 or 12 when Hitler came to power.

Their formative years were spent getting fed this ideology.

What would I have done?

- We have developed a really beautiful partnership with the Zekelman Holocaust Center.

They have been an amazing resource.

They are not only sharing word about the play with their audience and their constituents, but they are also, they're providing set pieces like the archival boxes.

And they're also, they have also opened up the museum and their education department and their archivists as a resource for the cast.

They are also participating as panelists in a number of post-show dialogues.

(director quietly talking) - It's a gift for the audience to be able to process, draw their own conclusions, and then be able to take a look in the mirror and ask, what history are we in now?

And how do I change from my seat, not from somebody else's seat, from me, a little bit in this world to be a little bit better.

And I think the play does its job when every person in the audience goes away thinking about that.

- Take care of your body.

- [Announcer] October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and a local woman is chronicling her personal journey with the disease in a new documentary titled "The Whitmore Project."

In the film, Lisa Whitmore Davis recounts her fight for survival from treatment to recovery.

Contributor Stephen Henderson of "American Black Journal" talked with Davis about the documentary.

(upbeat music) - So let's go back to the beginning.

- Sure.

- How this all sort of came into your life, and then how you decided to document it this way in a film.

- Thank you.

Late summer 2023, wasn't feeling well.

I was on my way to work, couldn't take full breaths.

I was ill, had three pulmonary embolisms, didn't know what was going on.

- Wow.

- Got to the hospital.

After that one week there, they went through many tests, went through several doctors, hematology, pulmonology, endocrinology.

And then it was finally in late fall of '23 when I went to my normal regular checkup with my OB/GYN, and she asked me, Lisa, what you been up to?

And I says, oh, I was in the hospital for a week in August.

She was like, that's not normal.

And because I'm a photophile, my parents always took pictures.

My dad took pictures of fish showing, and he'd go on his fishing trips.

So I've always chronicled my life, whatever I'm eating, whatever I'm going through, through this whole journey, going to all these various doctors, going to all these various tests, and then in January receiving that one horrible news that I had breast cancer.

- Yeah.

- And not only was it a challenge, Stephen, that I chronicled the challenges that I faced during that time period.

Understanding and having a deeper understanding of the health disparities that many folks in our community experience.

- Yes.

- I work as an aging professional, always trying to help folks navigate through those, but then facing them myself, it was quite a challenge.

Go through chemo.

I go through radiation.

On the last day of my treatment, my daughter and one of her dear friends, Christian Wallingford, who was just finishing up film school, he followed me that day.

And my daughter Alante, Dr.

Alante Whitmore, she was like, oh, my mama will enjoy this.

And at the end of that day, we sat down, we looked at the film footage from that day, and then my daughter just flippantly said, you know, she has like a thousand pictures in her phone, tons of video in her phone.

And he was like, really?

And he says, let's take a look at it.

And we sat down and through months of editing of 80% of the film, coming from my.

- [Stephen] From your phone.

- From my phone, and learning that Droid to iPhone and Mac translation.

But then realizing that not only was this a way to chronicle what I experienced, but I think to help others - Yeah.

- Who are looking at a catastrophic illness like cancer can destroy your financial security.

- Sure.

- But if you don't know about the resources or the where to go or how to go about it, being able to push back with doctors and say something is wrong with me.

- Yeah, I mean, you know, hearing you tell that story, you get hospitalized, and did anyone think about the possibility that this could be cancer or that they needed to check while that was happening?

I mean, and look, that's an emergency situation.

People are trying to figure out what's going on.

But did it ever occur to anyone in that situation that this was what might be going on?

- Stephen, sadly only one doctor came in my hospital room and said, he asked me, do you have cancer?

And I says, no.

And that was the only time someone ever even broached the subject of cancer.

But we find from research that the American Cancer Society provides that one in seven of folks who have blood clots have some type of unknown malignancy.

And I was one of those folks.

- [Stephen] Yeah.

- My oncologist told my daughter, your mother's very lucky because she has a very aggressive cancer and had she, it had not been found by the pulmonary embolisms, I wouldn't have been able to detect it myself.

And I was up to date on my mammograms.

- [Stephen] Yeah.

- I'm not a doctor dodger.

- [Stephen] Right, right.

- I believe that.

- [Stephen] You're doing the right thing.

- Doing the right thing.

But because of the cancer being the way it was, it was hidden.

And those, I call them my three blessings, they were that red flag that made me slow down and made me be more, even more intentional around what was going on with my health.

But I also wanna give credit to one doctor who said that's not normal.

- Right, right.

- Let's sit down and figure this out.

- And figure this out.

So I imagine that the process of putting the film together and, you know, producing it and sharing it with the world is cathartic in many ways.

Talk about how that feels to go through that process after you've been through the process of beating cancer.

- It is cathartic.

- Yeah.

- It puts purpose to the many painful days and nights that myself and my daughter, who was by my side and cared for me and my friends.

But also because service is important.

For example, in the film we talk about my mother and father.

My mother was the, she was a nurse, RN, there in Benson Harbor where I'm from, small town.

My dad was a retired school teacher, and both, they were involved with service.

My dad went to Monrovia, Liberia as a volunteer, and at the age of 67, he went to the Peace Corps after my mother passed away.

- [Stephen] Wow.

- My mother was a health activist.

She held the first blood drive in a Black church in the late 60s in Benton Harbor.

My mother also was a volunteer with the American Cancer Society and with the crop walk and collecting glasses.

So that's a part of who I am because I lived in Herb and Vera's home, and I said, this is a way to not only honor them because my mother died from cancer at 64.

She was diagnosed at 57.

I was 57 when I was diagnosed.

- [Stephen] Wow, wow.

- My father died in 2019 from lung cancer.

Several family members have died from cancer, but I was never offered genetic testing.

- What about when you watch the film?

How does that feel?

- You know, I spent so much time in the editing process with Christian and Alante, but every time I watch it, I feel a different experience.

We just showed it in Martha's Vineyard on the 22nd of August, and I cried, and my friend asked me, she said, "Why are you crying?"

I said, you know, a year ago I was here in Martha's Vineyard and I could barely walk around.

I was bald, I was weak, and I'm here with a film that I never imagined would even exist.

I'm grateful, and just recounting it I can't help but become emotional.

And I have many friends, unfortunately, that have faced cancer and didn't make it.

But I'm here.

- Yeah.

- So I feel it's important that I help people navigate through the fear of cancer.

Cancer is very frightening.

But I hope that when people watch my film, Stephen, they laugh because I got good jokes.

(Stephen laughing) They cry.

- Yeah, yeah.

- They sing along with me.

They even say amen at the end when my pastor does a prayer in the film.

It's an interactive space where I think the fear is diminished.

But we also hope that they get that inspiration to, if I'm feeling kind of bad, and I've been ignoring that, let me pay attention.

- Yeah, yeah, pay attention.

There's such a need in our community to do that.

- Right.

- At the same time, we need other people in the medical community to pay more attention as well, right?

- Yeah, absolutely.

- We need them to be more vigilant about making sure that they're asking the right questions.

And I think it's hard to know how we are supposed to navigate that, right?

We can't change the medical establishment.

We can change our own behavior.

But that part of it is kind of elusive.

- One thing that I talk about in the film, I was a part of a clinical study.

We as people of color, we shy away from clinical studies, and we have good reason to.

But I also know the value that if my data as a Black 58-year-old woman can help in developing the next set of cancer solutions, I owe it to be a part of that.

- [Stephen] Right.

- And I benefit.

- [Stephen] Yeah.

- You know, when you're in a clinical study, you get the top of the line care that you're supposed to get as well as that that is new.

- [Stephen] Yes.

- [Announcer] A public screening of "The Whitmore Project," along with a health and resource fair will take place on October 4th at the northwest campus of Wayne County Community College District.

Let's turn now to Destination Detroit, our series that explores the region's rich history and the people who helped shape it.

We hear from Jose Robinson, a resident of southwest Detroit.

He shares how he came to the city and reconnected with his Latino roots.

- The first time that I came here was the first time that I saw snow.

(upbeat music) I was actually adopted from Honduras.

So essentially my mom grew up here in Detroit, so she knew more about it.

So for me, it was like kind of even learning the culture, learning the language, learning everything.

I had no idea.

So the first time that I came here was the first time that I saw snow.

I was adopted by a Black mom.

So essentially I grew up in Black Detroit, right?

Southwest Detroit was so new to me in high school.

So I went years without really realizing, knowing, wait, people speak Spanish in Detroit?

I had no idea.

So when I went to high school, I went to Chadsey, which closed down, but there was a lot of Spanish speaking people there.

And that was the first time that I got back into my own culture and said, wait a minute, there's people like me here.

So imagine me, I'm a Latino on Jefferson bus or on Dexter bus going to school.

I'm the only Latino in that community.

So for me, it was that community that brought me in, Black community that allowed me to kind of experience that side of things.

And then the Southwest side allowed me to go into my culture, understand what other Spanish cultures there are, and then saying there's a lot more to learn about who I am.

(upbeat music) - [Announcer] For more Destination Detroit stories, go to OneDetroitPBS.org/DestinationDe.

That'll do it for this week's "One Detroit."

Thank you for watching.

We leave you now with a performance from this year's Detroit PBS broadcast of the best of Concert of Colors, which featured a variety of music genres from around the world.

Here's Detroit Jazz saxophonist, clarinetist, producer and educator, Wendell Harrison.

(gentle drumming) (upbeat music) - [Wendell] Oh, really?

Y'all got some rhythm out there.

Yeah.

(upbeat music) Yeah.

(upbeat jazz music) - [Narrator] Across our MASCO family of companies, our goal is to deliver better living possibilities and make positive changes in the neighborhoods where we live, work, and do business.

MASCO, a Michigan company since 1929.

Support also provided by the Cynthia and Edsel Ford Fund for Journalism at Detroit PBS.

- [Announcer] The DTE Foundation is a proud sponsor of Detroit PBS.

Through our giving, we are committed to meeting the needs of the communities we serve statewide to help ensure a bright and thriving future for all.

Learn more at DTEFoundation.com.

- [Narrator] Nissan Foundation, Michigan Central, and viewers like you.