Frank Higgins’ play with music follows the Depression-era journey of two extraordinary women, each of whom is dependent on the other to gain acceptance in society. In 1935 Texas, Susannah, a Caucasian academic and song collector for the Library of Congress, visits a high-security prison where she meets Pearl, an African- American woman imprisoned for murder. Hoping to record the treasure trove of spirituals and African folk songs that only Pearl knows, Susannah bargains for Pearl’s parole and arranges for several public performances.

CITY OF NUMBERS was created by playwright Sean Christopher Lewis as part of an outreach effort in which he interviewed lifetime inmates at Graterford Prison about their work as mural artists. Since its early beginnings, CITY OF NUMBERS has grown into a dynamic one-man tour de force performance that interweaves the stories of dozens of Philadelphians - from convicted murderers to victims’ relatives to physicians to artists to community leaders to Mayor Michael Nutter.