Raisin Redux: A Hustle in the Sun

from NewsOne.com

A Hustle in the Sun
by Mark Anthony Neal

At a moment when Barack Obama is poised to make good on the promises to Black America that have long shriveled up, like that raisin in Langston Hughes “Harlem,” the ABC production missed an opportunity to make clear the political stakes that Hansberry wanted to address in the first place.

Ironically it was Sean Combs’s performance—from a limited actor, who can be described as adequate at best—that provides A Raisin in the Sun with any contemporary resonances. Combs is clearly no Sidney Poitier, but in fairness to Combs, Sidney Poitier wasn’t Sidney Poitier yet when he portrayed Walter Lee in the stage and Hollywood versions. What Combs did effectively was heighten the sense of hopelessness and even despair that animates Walter’s instincts as a hustler. And this is perhaps as it should be, since Combs, better than any of his generational peers—Misters Simmons and Carter included—embodies the hustling instinct of the so-called hip-hop generation.

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