Taylor ended up in New York. "Starving and paying my dues," she says. Her acting career eventually took off, and she kept on writing until that career took off, too. The first script she worked on at Sundance was in 1998. That play, "OO-BLA-Dee," won a best play award from the American Theatre Critics Association.

For the last decade, Taylor has worked for the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. She considers that theater her home, she says. She also has a close association with Emily Mann, the artistic director of the McCarter Theatre in New York.

It was Mann who was offered the chance to try to make a play out of a book of photos and oral interviews by Michael Cunningham and Craig Marberry. Mann called Taylor, and Taylor saw the book and felt an instant kinship with the women who wore the hats.

When she worked on the play at Sundance, she recalls, she realized she needed to develop a central character. She settled on the character of a young woman named Yolanda, who goes through a family crisis and is sent to live with a relative and attend church with a bunch of hat-wearing women.

As she wrote, she also researched the history of hats in black churches and learned that the idea of looking your best for worship went clear back to Africa. Her play draws a line from Africa, to slavery, to freedom, to a woman finally getting a good-paying job and buying a hat and a pocketbook and shoes to match. Taylor says, "There are so many stories cupped under the brim of those hats."

---

Other events

"Utah's Local Crowns," photo exhibit by Victor Rivera, in the theater lobby. "Portraits of Black Women in Church Hats," photo exhibit, Utah Cultural Celebration Center, 1365 W. 3100 South, West Valley; Mondays through Thursdays, 8 a.m. to 6 p.m., through Feb. 29. Also, at a variety of locations, a discussion series on fashion, social customs and African-American tradition (see the Web site).

---

If you go . . .

What: "Crowns"
Where: The Grand Theatre, 1575 S. State
When: Friday through Feb. 9, 7:30 p.m.
How much: $10$24
Phone: 957-3322
Web: www.the-grand.org

---

E-mail: susan@desnews.com