Playbill: Tonya Pinkins knows she has a reputation for being difficult. In fact, when director Robert O'Hara wanted Pinkins to star in his Off-Broadway revival of Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, Pinkins knew what people were saying about her. “People were trying to tell him not to hire me,” she says.
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I’ve read about lots of theater critics that get called out and I have a couple theories as to why. The people who make it to be the New York Times theater critics have probably come from very similar backgrounds, by I think what may be the biggest problem is that if you’re seeing a professional production - probably the first one you saw is the way you think it’s supposed to be and we get trapped in a cyclical interpretation of what interpretation we should be doing. Changing it isn’t an inherently bad thing, not to mention the fact that everything can’t be happy-go-lucky or protect white/male feelings. I think it would be interesting to see this version of the show and I’m curious to see how the after effects of a stroke affect how we view the characters. It’s also interesting to hear that this actor has been blacklisted for being difficult to work with - which this feels like it was a pile on onto her.
I recently had the pleasure and opportunity to see Raisin in the Sun at the Pittsburgh Public Theatre. This experience has definitely aided me with context for this article. The play is quite intricate and layered with its messages. I mean this in the way that Raisin’ in the Sun centralizes flawed characters who make mistakes, imperfect endings and ambiguity galore. I remember seeing the show and had a similar takeaway to Tonya. One that felt betrayed by the fragility of toxic masculinity. The story portrays how even in a matriarchal intergenerational family, masculinity “triumphs”. Shown by the mistreatment and misogyny shown in the play. As well as the importance placed on consoling Walter Lee. Walter Lee is the live embodiment of how toxic masculinity hurts everyone. Not only does it take chances from femme presenting persons but also put unreachable standards for masculine presenting persons. In the end, no one truly wins.
Tonya Pinkins is a woman after my own heart. I so deeply respect anyone who is willing to call out bullshit when they see it, even if it makes people uncomfortable, especially if they aren’t someone who typically has power in our white supremacist patriarchal society. I am familiar with A Raisin in the Sun, but I do not know it that well. However, hearing Pinkins’s description of it, with the mother as the central figure having to deal with a man’s selfish dream, that sounds incredibly right. Like that is the type of play I would want to go see, and I can’t imagine anyone having problems with it. I guess Owen has a point about how people latch on to their first interpretation of a media and anything that comes after is wrong. However, theater is always evolving and I would hope that if you are being paid to critique it, you would do your due diligence of going into a production with an open mind and actually do some research before saying that’s not what the playwright wanted.
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