Guthrie Theater

A recent widow, Lena Younger wants to use her husband's insurance money to buy a home for her family, freeing them from the cramped tenement in which she, her two children, daughter-in-law and grandson live. Her son, Walter Lee, is determined to invest the money in a business - an opportunity for him to be his own man and not just the driver for his white boss. Lena refuses; in her eyes a house is a sturdy thing to build a dream on, one that can relieve the strains that poverty has put on the family. But when a white representative of the neighborhood "welcoming committee" presents the Younger's with an offer to buy them out of their home to prevent integration in their community, the dream of the house quickly becomes a nightmare.

A Raisin in the Sun opened on Broadway in 1959 and for the first time hailed an all-black principal cast, a black playwright and a black director. It was nominated for four Tony Awards. 2009 marks the 50th anniversary of the inspiring classic about a working class black family struggling to make it in America.

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