For two days in late October 2026, the auditorium at Booker T. Washington High School in Norfolk will hold a room full of people watching a story told on a stage. The occasion is "Born a Revel: Alumni & Community Reunion Production," a historical theatre piece performed four times across Friday, October 23 and Saturday, October 24, 2026, at the S. L. Roundtree Theatre at 1111 Park Avenue.
The schedule is built for both school audiences and evening crowds. There is a 9:30 a.m. performance on Friday the 23rd, followed by a 7 p.m. show that evening. Saturday the 24th offers a 1 p.m. matinee and a 7 p.m. evening performance. The City of Norfolk's community calendar lists the event as "historical theatre performances," and VisitNorfolk lists the price as to be announced, so attendees should expect details on admission to come from the school or the production itself rather than a ticketing platform.
What the production is about is described, in the sparse way grant listings often do, by Norfolk Arts. Among the nonprofit organizations receiving city arts funding, the listing for "Born a Revel – Alumni & Community Reunion Production" calls it "a theatrical experience exploring themes of freedom, identity, and generational legacy rooted in Virginia history." That short description is the clearest public statement of the show's subject: freedom, identity, and inheritance, told through a Virginia lens.
The setting matters as much as the script. The S. L. Roundtree Theatre is named for Samuel L. Roundtree, the teacher, director, and choreographer whose guidance elevated Booker T. Washington's theatre program from 1984 to 1991 and who oversaw the development and introduction of the school's Academy for Visual and Performing Arts. The New Journal and Guide reported on the dedication ceremony that renamed the auditorium in his honor, describing an emotional evening of tributes, performances, and the unveiling of a commemorative plaque, timed to Roundtree's 78th birthday. Former students spoke about his standards. "Mr. Roundtree expected your best and did not allow any excuses from any of us," said Hermione Patrick, a former BTW student and Thespian, in the Journal and Guide's account.
A petition circulated in support of the renaming made the case in generational terms: Roundtree "may have taught your mother, maybe your grandmother," it read, noting that he ran his own studio while remaining a fixture in Norfolk schools, and crediting him with pioneering the arts movement in Hampton Roads. The school itself, now home to an arts academy, has a history its principal, Matthew Mason, has described as unusually deep; the Journal and Guide noted that the school's legacy reaches from a civil rights museum in Memphis to the international jazz scene, where drummer Grover "Sangoma" Everett is regarded as one of the world's top jazz drummers.
That is the tradition the October reunion production is stepping into. An alumni-and-community reunion show is a particular kind of local theatre: part performance, part homecoming, with graduates returning to the same stage where they once rehearsed, and neighbors invited in alongside them. Four showtimes over two days suggest an ambition to fill the house more than once, and a daytime slot on Friday points to student audiences seeing work made about the history they are inheriting.
Details beyond the dates, times, and venue remain thin. Neither the city calendar nor VisitNorfolk names a director, cast, or playwright, and no ticket vendor is listed. Anyone planning to attend should watch for announcements from Booker T. Washington High School and the Academy of the Arts, and should treat the published showtimes as the firm information available: 9:30 a.m. and 7 p.m. on Friday, October 23, and 1 p.m. and 7 p.m. on Saturday, October 24, 2026, at the S. L. Roundtree Theatre, 1111 Park Avenue, Norfolk.
For a school whose auditorium bears the name of a man honored for decades of mentorship and direction in theatre and performing arts, a reunion production about freedom and generational legacy is a fitting use of the room. The seats are the same ones generations of Norfolk families have filled. In October, they will be asked to fill them again.