When Lorraine Hansberry’s debut play premiered in 1959, it marked a groundbreaking moment in modern American theatre. Her drama, about a Black family set to move into a white neighbourhood in segregation-era Chicago, became the first play by a Black woman to be produced on Broadway – and one performed by a largely Black cast.
The story of the impoverished Younger family whose recently deceased patriarch has left them with insurance money that may help realise their dreams, retains its power, with resonant themes of class, male chauvinism, assimilation and generational difference in the Black community.
Headlong’s co-production plays it straight, as a period piece with few distractions from its rich language and artful structure, although some of its most dangerous edges are softened by humour and warmth in this cramped family set up. There is formidable matriarch Lena (Doreene Blackstock); her oldest child, Walter Lee (Solomon Israel), a chauffeur who dreams of owning a liquor store with the help of her insurance money; and younger daughter, Beneatha (Joséphine-Fransilja Brookman), who is planning to become a doctor.
Directed by Tinuke Craig, it is faithful in its kitchen-sink realism, even though the set, designed by Cécile Trémolières, has expressionist elements, with transparent walls that convey a sense of forced exposure and intimacy in this down-at-heel rented apartment. The pace is perhaps too leisurely in the first half, with actors sometimes speaking over each other, but it builds tension with Hansberry’s many plot turns well-handled.
Beneatha is comically played as a spoilt child, her suitors a little too evidently like vehicles representing the opposing forces of assimilation on the part of rich college kid, George (Gilbert Kyem Jr) and Nigerian-born Joseph (Kenneth Omole), who raises Beneatha’s consciousness on Black identity and African heritage.
Characters remain lovable even at their most unreasonable. There is clearly love among them but the razor-edges of animosity, anguish and disappointment are not sustained for long enough, although the clash between Walter and Ruth (Cash Holland) carries force, as well as Walter’s financial misstep. The show becomes more hard-edged as it goes along, and Israel is especially good as a man tormented by his dreams, along with Holland as a woman exhausted by her poverty.
The final scene keeps its uplifting power and it gives the production its satisfying shape. You stay worried for these characters as they walk into a bigger life, albeit in a white neighbourhood that does not want them in its midst. This ending is not only about Black pride, or freedom, but the continued fight for them to be seen. They are up for it.
At Leeds Playhouse until 28 September. Then at Oxford Playhouse, 2-5 October; Lyric Hammersmith, London, 8 October-2 November; and Nottingham Playhouse, 5-16 November.
