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Portrait of a complex artist painted in Hall

Lorraine Hansberry captures the artisitc process

by Briana Flinchbaugh

To Be Young, Gifted and Black serves as an amazing portrait of its artist, Lorraine Hansberry. Her life, her work and her inspiration come to life in this cunning and touching performance of the autobiographical play.

Extracts from Hansberry's journal, stories of her childhood and scenes from several of her plays are brought together in a manner that illuminates the artistic process with all its glories and dilemmas. The audience is witness, as Hansberry learns about her family's heritage of slavery, struggles with classism during the Depression, discovers her feminist and sexual self, ponders the Black American experience, and finally decides to write about it all.

The set, lighting and music that form the backdrop to Hansberry's life are so aesthetically pleasing. It is easy to dive into the artistic mindset that recognizes the beauty in both fortune and pain. The set design is immediately striking in its simplicity and efficacity.

The staggered staircase works very well for the ensemble scenes, allowing the audience to get a great view of all the smaller scenes going on simultaneously. The blank "sky" backdrop in combination with various colored lights set the mood for each scene maybe even better than the dialogue. Finally, the huge portrait of Lorraine Hansberry displayed just to the side of the stage is a constant reminder that the play is about a real woman and these are the experiences that shaped her life.

Music directors and musicians, Joseph Friedman and Micha Patri, are commendable. African and jazz rhythms spice up the production and give emphasis to significant moments and scene transitions. Soloists Annie Lee Moffett and Michael S. Preacely, who sing "Drinking Gourd," a moving song about running away from slavery, are also tremendous talents. It seems, however, that the general chorus needs another week of rehearsal.

There are, however, a few structural drawbacks to the play. The opening scene is a little confusing because the ensemble of 12 actors is on stage and all, or at least many, have lines Hansberry said herself, while some are performing cuts from A Raisin in the Sun and The Sign in Sidney Brustein's Window. In fact, by the end of the play, the 12 cast members cover a total of more than 50 characters.

Several actresses portray Hansberry, and this almost gives the impression that she may have suffered from multiple personality disorder. The three "main Hansberry's," Monique J. Askew, Adeola Oshodi and Amy A. Silveri, all do a magnificent job getting into the sarcastic nature of Lorraine Hansberry and reflecting her deeper philosophical musings.

The play jumps around so much between extracts from other plays, childhood anecdotes, journal entries and quotes from Hansberry herself. It is often difficult to keep up with the action; it may be particulary tricky to keep up for someone who is not familiar with Hansberry's works. By about halfway through the first act it gets easier to follow. Consistent themes in music or lighting, for example, might signal "extract" or "anecdote."

Scene VIII: The Writing Process is particularly interesting. Seated center is Hansberry at her writing desk, moments after she has announced her decision "I am a writer and I will write." The ensemble is gathered around her echoing lines from previous scenes as she calls back to memory the many rich experiences that inspired her breakthrough play A Raisin in the Sun. At this point, all the chaos and jumps of the first scenes culminate and it becomes clear how they all fit together. Act One ends with a key scene from this masterpiece and the lights go down as Hansberry's triumph almost justifies all her previous trials.

Act Two moves more slowly than Act One, and the cast seems to gradually lose some of its energy and enthusiasm. This is especially noticeable in the singing and dancing that barely takes place in the second act. The finale chorus of To Be Young, Gifted and Black is hardly the Hallelujah Chorus one expects after the amazing speech, made by Silveri, that inspires it. Still, Act Two has its moments, including that speech, and a terrific discussion between Hansberry and an "intellectual" white man at a cocktail party, the conclusion of which is so idealistic the audience can't help but laugh a little.

To Be Young, Gifted, and Black is a social critique and an autobiography. Most of all, in its theme and its incarnation, it is a celebration of art and life.


Photo:
Young, Gifted: Hansberry's introspective play. (photo by Keri Marcovici)


Oberlin

Copyright © 1996, The Oberlin Review.
Volume 125, Number 5; October 4, 1996

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