Ellis Finney, a young up-and-coming playwright from Gloucester, will see his monologue featured this weekend at SHINE: Illuminating Black Stories, an annual evening of storytelling that explores the black experience in Virginia and Appalachia, held at the Barter Theatre in Abingdon in southwestern Virginia.
The 2016 Gloucester High School grad, who is currently working toward his Master of Fine Arts in Screenwriting at Columbia University in New York City, will present his monologue “To Put My Trust In You” on Sunday at the storytelling festival.
Black playwrights from different areas of the country were invited to compose original monologues based on writing prompts derived from the theater’s local black community and the wider Appalachian region.
Finney’s monologue is about Clarence, a black worker for the University of Virginia, speaking to the families of Charlottesville’s Vinegar Hill neighborhood during a town meeting, who tries to convince them the plans the university has for them are beneficial.
The inspiration behind his most recent monologue was a part in the film “There Will Be Blood.”
“I came across the prompt about the neighborhood of Vinegar Hill in Charlottesville and around the time I found this prompt, I was really into this film called ‘There Will Be Blood’ by Paul Thomas Anderson,” said Finney. “The main character gives a monologue to the residents of this neighborhood and tries to convince the residents of this neighborhood that his company would be a good thing for them, but of course it’s not. Once I saw that monologue and I was considering the prompt of Vinegar Hill I was like—there might be something here.”
“It’s very exciting,” said Finney. “I am still very young in my career, so the idea of people appreciating something I’ve written and being a part of a group like this is still wild to me. It’s still unreal.”
Originally from Brooklyn, New York, Finney was raised in Gloucester by his mother, Kimberly Matera, his grandmother, Joyce Sparks, and his dogs, Mary Jane and Peter Parker. After graduating from GHS, he went to James Madison University, earning a Bachelor of Arts degree in English with a minor in Creative Writing.
Finney always had an interest in film. One of the films that left an impression on him was the 2014 thriller “Gone Girl.”
“After watching it (‘Gone Girl’) I was like I need to figure out who is behind this,” said Finney. “I was just so mind-blown.”
While in high school, he worked at York River Crossing Cinemas at Gloucester Point. For his senior class project, his English teacher Michelle Waravdekar allowed him to make a film. That film is based on the book “Twisted,” which they had been reading in class. He said that her support for that project and her class in general was influential for him.
“Ever since that project, that’s when I was like, I think I would like to do this, as wild as it sounds, as a career,” he said
Finney started creating his monologue for SHINE last November. It took him a week of thinking about the prompt and it took another week of writing it, which he completed at the end of that month.
Finney has received multiple awards and accolades for his work including being named a Cy Twombly Graduate Fellow for the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in 2022, receiving a creative writing award for his short story “Sport Star” from James Madison University as well as being a quarterfinalist for the ScreenCraft Screenwriting Fellowship for his pilot called “Violet.” His films have been screened at the Virginia Film Festival, Charlottesville’s McGuffey Art Center, as well as The Studio Museum in Harlem in New York City.
Finney is currently working on a project for his thesis that will be filmed in Gloucester with producer Jeff Lichtenstein. He intends on doing it in October of this year.
“I am looking forward to it,” he said.