Media Contact: Pat JaCoby (858) 534-7404, or Jan Jennings (858) 822-1684 

Before It Hits Home, a play by award-winning playwright Cheryl West directed by Floyd Gaffney, an emeritus drama professor at the University of California, San Diego, will be presented March 1-18 at the Urban Village Theatre, 3795 Fairmount Ave., in the City Heights area of San Diego.

The play is being presented by Community Partners, a collaborative effort to help fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the African American and Hispanic communities of San Diego.

Before It Hits Home is about an African American jazz musician who is covertly bisexual, but who endangers both himself and others when he contracts HIV and fails to disclose the illness that threatens those close to him.

"In a metaphysical sense, (the musician) reveals the deep-seated denial of this disease among African American and Hispanic individuals," Gaffney says. "This is not a play about victimization, but rather it is a wakeup call to humanity, especially in the people of color communities."

Gaffney holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Adelphi University in Garden City, New York, and a doctorate from Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh, Pa. He has been a UCSD professor of drama since 1971 and has directed locally, nationally, and internationally.

Tickets for Before It Hits Home are $10. For information call Vanessa Feaster at (619) 692-5549 or the Center for Social Support & Education at (619) 574-8015.