ARTIST SHARES TRIUMPHANT STORY OF MENTAL HEALTH JOURNEY

Nikki Lynette is a mental health advocate and artist. Her “Get Out Alive” will be available online in January. Photo by Mo Parker
Nikki Lynette is a mental health advocate and artist. Her “Get Out Alive” will be available online in January. Photo by Mo Parker

 Artist shares triumphant story of mental health journey

BY TIA CAROL JONES
     Musical artist Nikki Lynette has created a theatrical music performance based on her journey with mental health. “Get Out Alive” is an online theater experience where Nikki Lynette shares her story with the audience that features new songs and visual media.
     Nikki Lynette’s music has been featured on popular TV shows and she has written about mental health, depression and suicide for media outlets. She also has a documentary entitled, “Happy Songs about Unhappy Things.” Her advocacy comes out of her personal experiences with a post traumatic stress disorder and an anxiety disorder.
     Nikki Lynette said she did not want to create such a personal piece and that she was encouraged to do it while she was recovering from being suicidal. She said, at the time, she was sure her mentor, who encouraged her to do it, was trying to keep her busy and get her back into creating.
     Nikki Lynette said while she was familiar with the theater format, she had never written a play. “I didn’t want make the type of plays that I had seen. They didn’t really connect with me. So, I wanted something uniquely mine. If I was going to talk about my life, that meant it had to be hip hop, it had to be crunk, it had to be gritty,” she said.
     Nikki Lynette said she had an idea of how she wanted to do the play. She workshopped the idea when she opened for the Russian activist performance group, Pussy Riot. She said people responded to it and knew it would work. So, she returned home and wrote it in that style, with that approach.
     “Get Out Alive” debuted as part of the Steppenwolf Theatre Company’s LookOut Series. It sold out and more shows were added. Then, COVID-19 hit. “I would be in a theater right now if the pandemic wasn’t going on. I would be in a major theater that is now closed because of COVID,” she said.
     Nikki Lynette said it wasn’t really a jump to go from writing articles to creating a theater piece because she is an artist who creates and performs music, who writes songs and raps.
    “I was writing about it because I wanted to talk about it. And, I wanted to talk about [it] from the perspective of somebody, not that got over [it], that is still living with it,” she said. “Because I still have a mental illness, I have PTSD and I’m a suicide survivor. So, that is the perspective that [I] write from. That is the perspective that I do everything from.”
    Nikki Lynette said her director, Roger Ellis, is one of the most motivating, inspiring people she has known in all of her days. She said Roger brings out the best in everybody. She said when she met Roger, it was kismet. She said the things she’s learned from Roger impact every aspect of her life.
     “One of the most important things I learned from Roger - Roger told me when you are creating something, you are not asking for permission to go into anybody’s else’s world, no, you’re bringing them into yours,” she said. “So, we shouldn’t be writing, thinking how can I make this fit into that or we shouldn’t be creating music thinking how can I fit in with this. That’s not the way. You should always be creating from the perspective of bringing people into your world.”
    Nikki Lynette said people always ask if it is hard for her to perform the play due to the subject matter. She said it is not because she relives those moments all the time, because of her PTSD.
“What’s enjoyable about doing the play is that I get to experience these thoughts and these things but with perspective, with context. So, these emotions aren’t just popping up and being revisited, they have context,” she said.
     Nikki Lynette added those memories don’t pop up and she doesn’t experience as many as the triggers because she’s already addressing it and dealing with it. She said it’s easier to process that way. She said it’s important to create work that talks about mental health, depression and suicide because people are not talking about it from a perspective with potential solutions.
     “I think it’s important to talk about it because this is how we normalize it,” she said. “I would like to see something different, where we’re not just being reactionary to these things but being proactive about how we have these conversations and what solutions really look like.”
    “Get Out Alive” will premiere online on Jan. 30, 2021. For more information, visit nikkilynette.com/the-play.

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