How 2 Seattle productions tackle race, social justice, and the right to just be

“This Bitter Earth” and “The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window” are both playing this month in Seattle.

On one stage, a curtain opens as two men sit in their apartment.

“I find it hard to believe you’re not bothered by what you see around, when you watch the news, read the paper, leave your apartment,” says Neil, a white, Black Lives Matter activist to his boyfriend, a Black playwright named Jesse.

On another stage, in another theater, an editor named Sidney Brustein tells a reporter, “Above all else, keep your conscience to yourself. It’s the only form of compassion left.”

One of those plays, "This Bitter Earth," is modern, written in 2020. The other — "The Sign in Sidney Brustein’s Window" — was first performed in 1964.