Theater review by Regina Robbins
Although it may well be the most famous work by a Black playwright, A Raisin in the Sun has spent a lot of time in the shade. Its original 1959 Broadway production, starring Sidney Poitier, ran for more than a year, but Lorraine Hansberry’s groundbreaking drama did not return to the Great White way until 2004, with Sean "P. Diddy" Combs in the Poitier role; by then, what was once a contemporary portrait of an African-American family crushed by past and present racism had become a bit of a period piece. A second brief Broadway revival followed in 2014, headlined this time by Denzel Washington. Now the Public Theater has brought Raisin back for yet another look in a well-acted and agonizingly relevant production that makes the magnitude of Hansberry’s achievement crystal clear.
New York stage legend Tonya Pinkins anchors the production as family matriarch Lena Younger, who has to decide what to do with an insurance payout after her husband’s death. Should it be invested in the entrepreneurial dreams of her son, Walter (Francois Battiste), who is desperate to provide more for his exhausted wife, Ruth (Mandi Masden), and their young child? Or would it be better spent on the education of her daughter, Beneatha (Paige Gilbert), whose ambition is a source of both pride and unease?
Director Robert O’Hara (Bootycandy) has spent most of his career staging and sometimes writing new plays, and he approaches this classic with fresh eyes. Poitier’s charisma notwithstanding, it seems incredible that anyone ever centered Walter in this story; in some scenes here, he functions more like an antagonist, insisting that the aspirations of the women around him be subordinate to his. But when the greater enemy—white supremacy—shows up at the front door of the Youngers’ miserable apartment, all internal divisions go by the wayside, confirming that the family unit as a whole is the core of the drama.
O’Hara’s vision includes a few creative embellishments to Hansberry’s largely naturalistic text that seem like attempts to fix what isn’t broken: an offstage sex scene, several appearances by the ghost of Walter Sr., a final tableau that defies anyone to call the play’s ending happy. But the revival is buoyed less by these metatheatrical flourishes than by the full-bodied performances of the cast. O’Hara’s production rejects sentimentality: Even as we absorb the characters’ frustration and despair, we also witness their reflexive meanness, frequent pettiness and casual violence toward one another. This, A Raisin in the Sun suggests, is another legacy of oppression. Hansberry’s defining work may not be radical in form, but it remains a landmark of radical truth-telling in the theater.
A Raisin in the Sun. Public Theater (Off Broadway). By Lorraine Hansberry. Directed by Robert O’Hara. With Tonya Pinkins, Francois Battiste, Paige Gilbert, Mandi Masden. Running time: 2hrs 50mins. One intermission. Through November 20.
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