Theatre in Review: A Raisin in the Sun (Public Theater) The sheer indestructibility of Lorraine Hansberry's pioneering Black drama is on display at the Public, most notably in its ability to withstand Robert O'Hara's directorial touches, some of which are more inspired than others. A Raisin in the Sun remains an astonishingly solid piece of dramatic construction, in which the simple, oft-used device of a financial legacy casts a stark light on cruelly marginalized lives. A $10,000 insurance payment offers a blessed windfall for the members of the Younger family, offering a way out of their slum apartment on Chicago's South Side. But having lived so long on the scraps of a white-dominated society, the money is both a source of hope and agony, exposing their competing dreams and climaxing in a confrontation that threatens to blow them apart. It is interesting how various productions of this ensemble piece draw attention to different characters. The 2004 Broadway revival was dominated by Phylicia Rashad as worn-down, yet iron-willed, matriarch Lena Younger, intent on moving her fractious clan to decent housing in a white suburb. A 2014 production -- like its predecessor, directed by Kenny Leon -- generated considerable tension between Denzel Washington and Sophie Okonedo as Walter Lee, Lena's hustling, ambitious son, looking to finance a liquor store, and Ruth, his wife, fighting to save her troubled marriage. At the Public, the most striking character, to my mind, is Beneatha (Paige Gilbert), Lena's daughter, an independent-minded medical student juggling a pair of radically different boyfriends. In Gilbert's performance, Beneatha seemingly stands in for an entire generation of Black woman on the cusp of tumultuous social change. This is in keeping with O'Hara's production, which uses both naturalistic and stylized elements to position the play in a broader historical context. The tiny apartment designed by Clint Ramos -- marked by frayed furniture, curling wallpaper, and smoke-stained walls -- is a laboratory of frustrations, a cramped, crabbed space where a moment's peace can't be found.Alex Jainchill's lighting accentuates the squalor, letting in only the weakest touch of sunshine through the tiny window. The company nails the play's big moments -- Lena forcing a defiant Beneatha to her knees, a furious dispute between Ruth and Walter Lee that ends in a passionate embrace -- as well as the little ones: the morning dash to the bathroom down the hall, a set of skirmishes over the breakfast table, and Beneatha deftly slipping a can of roach killer out of a suitor's line of vision. But directors will direct; apparently determined to put his stamp on the production, O'Hara unpacks a mixed bag of innovations. He restores a scene featuring the garrulous Mrs. Johnson, a professional nuisance from next door who, commandeering some coffee and pie, sweetly lets the Youngers know that they are getting above their station. Cut from most productions, it's a sharply written cameo, here played to the hilt by Perri Gaffney. If it pushes the play's running time to over three hours, but it makes a solidly comic contribution to the overall tension onstage. O'Hara also interpolates a silent ghost figure, the family's patriarch, whose death is the source of the contested money. He comes and goes at intervals, accompanied by the appropriate lighting and sound cues, unseen by the others. Done once, it adds a haunting reminder of what the family has lost; done several times, and combined with the many references to him in the text, it is an unnecessary illustration of an abundantly clear point. Other decisions actively irritate: Ruth and Walter Lee's big Act I argument ends here with them hustling off to the bedroom; fair enough, but the touching dialogue that follows is now a post-coital conversation delivered to the audience, via the sound system, from offstage. It's not a satisfying choice, by telegraphing the character's intimate exchanges from a remote location, our connection to them is derailed at a key moment. Most destructive is O'Hara's handling of Walter Lee's gorgeous Act II aria. Having lost most of the money, including the financing for Beneatha's education, in a fumbled business deal, Walter Lee stuns his loved ones, announcing his intention to take a buyout from a racist suburban homeowner's association. (The group offers to purchase the lease that Lena has secured on that long-dreamed-of house.) He pours out a lifetime's worth of rage, bitterly waving a flag of surrender to an unjust system if he can cash the check. Played straightforwardly by a capable actor, it's a heart-stopper. But O'Hara has Francois Battiste, who plays Walter, step forward into a hard spotlight, accompanied by a drumroll. On the acridly sardonic line, "Gonna put on a show for the man," he adds, "Like this one," producing a Playbill for, yes, A Raisin in the Sun. Battiste just about pulls it off, but the gesture is far too cute by half; the speech becomes a self-conscious turn, a non-musical eleven o'clock number that actively undermines the scene's savage power. Finally, following the play's joyous conclusion, which sees the Youngers leaving for their new home, O'Hara engineers a coup de théâtre, not to be described here, that acts as a violent reversal of fortune. I'm of two minds about this one: It's certainly a realistic assessment of what might happen next, and it packs a powerful punch, but Hansberry's script is hardly blind to the obvious troubles ahead. And, really, can't the Youngers be happy for at least a few minutes? Despite this editorializing, most of the production captures the frayed nerves and fierce attachments of the Youngers, their furious reaching out for a basic decency that should be their birthright. Battiste and Mandi Masden are a powerfully matched pair of combatants as Walter Lee and Ruth. (Especially affecting is her response to Walter Lee's complaint that she is always trying to feed him: "What else can I give you, Walter Lee Younger?," she asks helplessly, a heartbreaking admission of failure.) Gilbert gives Beneatha a sassy tongue and plenty of attitude, especially during an Act III meltdown in which she attacks the very idea of political progress; one wants to see the woman she will be in ten years' time. Tonya Pinkins is a towering, multidimensional Lena, God-fearing and warm to be sure, yet with an edge of toughness when challenged and, by the end, so ravaged that one fears she may have a stroke. Mister Fitzgerald and John Clay III cut distinctly different profiles as Beneatha's beaux, one a son of the Black bourgeoisie and the other a politically engaged student from Africa. Karen Perry's costume designs are right for the period and alert to the characters' varying backgrounds and classes. (Hair and wig designer Nikiya Mathis provides the contrasting coiffures for Beneatha that constitute an important plot point.) Elisheba Ittoop's sound design, using a system by Will Pickens, makes good use of music cuts on the radio, including Chuck Berry singing "Johnny B. Goode" and Ella Fitzgerald's heavenly take on "It's a Lovely Day Today." Brittany Bland's projection design figures prominently in the finale, which is effectively done no matter one thinks of it. A Raisin in the Sun is something of an outlier, being the rare non-Shakespearean revival at the Public. Interestingly, with this production and the recent Baldwin and Buckley at Cambridge, the company has turned to the Civil Rights Era for meaningful commentary on our own racially fraught moment. It's a valuable idea, but, as seen in the current revival of Death of a Salesman -- not to mention O'Hara's painful attempt, last season, at updating Eugene O'Neill's Long Day's Journey into Night -- certain classic American plays resist being interfered with. In this case, however, the play wins, decisively, making it very much worth seeing. And, really, isn't it time for a Lorraine Hansberry Theatre on Broadway? --David Barbour ![](/std_images/blank.gif)
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