Written by Eugene O'Neill
Directed by Godfrey Simmons
Where: Kiplinger Theatre, Schwartz Center for the Performing Arts
When: April 29-30, May 6-7, 2016 at 7:30pm, May 7, 2016 at 2 p.m.
Tickets: $8 students & seniors, $15 general BUY TICKETS
New York City. 1920s. Jim and Ella fell in love....Then they got married. Race. Love. Marriage. Hate.
For this provocative, rarely produced 1924 Eugene O’Neill play about interracial marriage, Civic Ensemble Artistic Director Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr. divides the audience by race. In the play, Jim, a black man, loves Ella, a white woman. She loves him back. They struggle to come together from grade school through high school graduation and into marriage. But the marriage begins to buckle under the weight of Jim's aspirations and Ella's fears, setting the stage for a rabid climax. O'Neill paints a bitter picture about the external pressures on interracial marriage, but the biggest pressures come from within Jim and Ella themselves.
Following the play there will be a discussion with the actors and director Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr.