CLYBOURNE PARK AT RED BARN THEATRE / SHOW OPENS MARCH 25th

Red Barn Theatre proudly presents the Pulitzer Prize winning CLYBOURNE PARK, written by Bruce Norris and directed by Carole MacCartee.

Norris somehow manages to juggle racism, social pressure and family dynamics into a blur of hilarity, irony and wit. The script tiptoes along the tightrope of things we are not allowed to say,  from “colored” to “Negro” to “Black” to “African American,” only falling off in an awkward half-save every few inches or so.

Every stereotype and cliché on the subject resurfaces as a quip.  J. Kelly Nestruck called it “A nasty and brilliant comedy” in the Globe and Mail.

In addition to the Pulitzer, it won the 2012 Tony Award for Best Play.   The Clybourne Park website describes it as a “wickedly funny and fiercely provocative play about race, real estate and the volatile values of each.”  It has won nearly every honor the theatre has to give, including Olivier Award, and the Evening Standard Award.

The play centers on a house sale and bursts upon the audience in two acts set 50 years apart.  The first act is in 1959, and the second, in contemporary times.

In the first act, nervous community leaders anxiously try to stop the sale of the home in a white community to a black family.

Act Two is set in the same house in the present day, as the now predominantly African-American neighborhood battles to hold its ground in the face of gentrification.

The dialogue shifts from more or less overt racist in Act One to more ore less Politically Correct in the second.

Harking back to the 1959 play (and later a film) A RAISIN IN THE SUN, that explored the dynamics of a black family moving into a white Chicago neighborhood, the action in CLYBOURNE PARK ‘s two outrageous acts occur before and after A RAISIN IN THE SUN.

Ben Brantley says in The New York Times: “Clybourne Park” provides the eternal and undeniable satisfactions of watching supposedly civilized people behaving like territorial savages.”

Director Carole MacCartee deftly molds the actors in the two distinct scenarios.  The cast is well known for comedic mayhem and includes Dave Bootle, Nicole Nuremberg, Amber McDonald Good, Chris Tittel, Tish Williams, Mook J and Matthew Hollis Hulsey.

The show opens March 25 and tickets are already selling fast. Call Red Barn Box Office at 305-296-9911 or go to www.redbarntheatre.com for tickets.

Save with season subscriptions for four shows! Talk to the box office about group prices and the very special “Dinner and a Show” with special menus at the Pier House and The Hard Rock Cafe.