WBGO JAZZ 88.3FM BROADCAST FROM TWO RIVER THEATEROn August 17, Two River audiences were treated to a live interview with director Carl Cofield and A Raisin in the Sun cast members Crystal A. Dickinson (Ruth Younger), Brandon J. Dirden (Walter Lee Younger) and Brenda Pressley (Lena Younger), hosted by WBGO News Director Doug Doyle and recorded for broadcast on WBGO Jazz 88.3 FM. To listen to the complete interview, visit www.wbgo.org/journal or www.tworivertheater.org

The following excerpts are edited and condensed from that conversation, which began with a discussion of the play’s continuing relevance today.

CARL COFIELD: The job of art is to hold a mirror up to society and ask big questions—no matter if we are looking at the Greeks, at Shakespeare, or at Lorraine Hansberry. For me, the big questions of this play are, “What price do we pay? How deep is our love and how deep is our trust and what are the bonds that unite us?”

CRYSTAL A. DICKINSON: I would add that Lorraine Hansberry considered herself not just a playwright but an activist, and this play is an example of her activism. I think she would say that the question is, “What happens to a dream deferred?” And we’re still asking that question.

BRANDON J. DIRDEN: Right. And I think what makes this act of activism particularly relevant today is the brilliance of Lorraine Hansberry to not just comment on a time—the 1950s in America—but to really unearth a deep truth about humanity. The truths that she excavates about race relations

in America in this particular play are unfortunately, yes, still timely. But this play is so good that even after—oh, please, God, one day—even after we can say, “Yes, the race relations here in America have so improved that we don’t have to have the same conversations that we’ve been having for the last 400 years,” even after we get to that point, we will still present A Raisin in the Sun because of its complex humanity.

What I’m finding out every day in rehearsal is how much Lorraine Hansberry loved us. She loves every single character she wrote and she loved us enough to expose our flaws. But she doesn’t leave us there. She never leaves anyone broken, not even you, the audience, as you watch this. She’s going to break you but she’s not going to leave you broken, and there’s so much love for these people and for the people she is asking to watch this journey. She loves you and she wants you to be a better you when you walk out of this theater.

CARL COFIELD: To Brandon’s point, I think the theater demands us to be participants, not just casual spectators or observers. So when you come in here and deal with the Youngers for two and a

half hours, I defy you not to be changed. There is a magic there that I think only can happen in the theater because of the ritual of coming to the theater. We’re in the same room breathing the same air, exhaling while they’re inhaling, and vice versa. There’s a magic that only can happen in this theater when these actors recite this beautiful, beautiful text.

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DOUG DOYLE: Brenda, what is the American dream today and has it changed since these characters wanted it so badly?

BRENDA PRESSLEY: I think the American dream has not changed. We want comfort, we want happiness, we want success in being the very best selves that we can be and for that to be true for the people whom we love. That doesn’t change, that’s universal; those kinds of things can be felt in Pakistan, China, across the street, anywhere you go. And that is the beauty of our humanity. That’s the beauty of our being in a world where yes, we have

Left to Right: Carl Cofield, Crystal A. Dickinson, Brandon J. Dirden, Brenda Pressley, and Doug Doyle. Photos by Carmen Balentine.

different religions and ways of dealing with day-to-day life, but pure love and devotion is the same. We have tweets and whatever going on left and right; we distance ourselves a bit from each other now and life’s circumstances, unfortunately. But dreams are as they were a thousand years ago.

DOUG DOYLE: Brandon, I’d like your comparison between August Wilson and Lorraine Hansberry.

BRANDON J. DIRDEN: In rehearsals recently, I’ve drawn several parallels to August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson. The Piano Lesson was written 25 years after A Raisin in the Sun, but it’s not strange that Boy Willie is drawn from the same well as Walter Lee Younger. It’s not far fetched that these two young men are striving to have that piece of Americana: life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. “Come hell or high water, damn whatever obstacle is in my way, I’m going to take that shot, right?”

CRYSTAL A. DICKINSON: I think in both plays, Boy Willie and Walter Lee are asking “Why don’t I deserve it? Am I not American? Do I not have this blood? Do I not have this heritage? Do I not own what this country promises? Why am I not deserving of it? What have I done to put me at a disadvantage?” And they’ve done nothing except be black and that’s just a truth. And I think in order to progress in this country, we have to be real and answer that question truthfully and say, “Yes, we have not afforded you what we

promised you.” And then move forward. Move forward.

BRENDA PRESSLEY: As I was preparing to come to rehearsal today, there was footage of Susan Bro, the mother who had to speak of her child who was murdered in Charlottesville, Heather Heyer. She stood at a podium and proclaimed her child as a martyr and with her head held high, she was able to celebrate her child’s purpose and the role that her child will play forevermore in this country’s history. And I thought of Lena Younger. I saw Lena standing there at that podium—a mother who fiercely loved her child.

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DOUG DOYLE: The character of Karl Lindner is trying to prevent the Younger family from moving into a primarily all-white neighborhood and offering them money to stay away.

CRYSTAL A. DICKINSON: We just talked about this today. Lorraine Hansberry herself was one of a family in an all-white neighborhood and she tells of how she was beaten up as a young child, how bricks were thrown through her family’s home. And I said, “You know, she endured all of that and then she writes a play where poor Travis has to endure the same thing. Why would she do that?” And then we read the end of the play and what I’ve come up with is that this is a family, very much like what Brenda is saying about this young woman being a martyr, a pioneer; this family is that, and what is going to help them get through that is the love that they have, the strength that they have as a family. And I think that’s what Lorraine Hansberry is trying to say. She’s trying to say that with faith and courage and love, as a country, we can do this, it’s possible. It’s going to be hard. It’s not going to be pretty but it’s possible.

DOUG DOYLE: Carl Cofield, what’s the conversation you want to hear audiences have at the end of this production?

CARL COFIELD: That this play has touched them in a profound way that starts conversation. I don’t care where the conversation leads, but we start a dialogue. I will say personally in this political climate, I do think the saving grace is that we are having—as Brandon and Crystal and Brenda—said earlier, we’re having tough conversations that need to happen. We have to talk, no matter how painful it is. If there’s a silver lining in all of this, we’re having tough conversations and to me, that is the import of the art.