Direct Arts Presents Lorraine Hansberry's LES BLANCS, 4/13

Direct Arts, a new intercultural theater and film company, will present for Take Two on Tuesday, April 13th, Tribeca Film Festival's 2009 Best Narrative Short, LA ROUTE DU NORD, followed by a staged reading of Lorraine Hansberry's last play LES BLANCS, which will feature a stellar ensemble cast and live African drumming.

Lebanese-French film star Carlos Chahine not only made his directorial debut, but also starred in the remarkable short film LA ROUTE DU NORD, playing a refugee who returns from France to his native Lebanon in order to fulfill a promise and finally transfer his father's remains from Beirut to their native village. In awarding LA ROUTE NORD Best Narrative Short last year, the Tribeca Film Festival jury called the film a "poetic, truthful and unsentimental portrait of an exile's return home...The director, Carlos Chahine, portrays the absurdities and contradictions of how we deal with grief through humor, freshness and subtlety."

Another piece in which the road home is unusually treacherous, LES BLANCS, by the great Lorraine Hansberry (A RAISIN IN THE SUN), is set in a fictional African country seething with revolt. A prodigal son returning from England for his father's funeral, is forced to confront the underbelly of the utopian mission that employed his family, and take his place in the revolution for independence. Directed by Craig Baldwin, the knockout cast features Christina Rouner, recently the title character in Red Bull's THE DUCHESS OF MALFI, and Keith Eric Chapelle, just finishing up Kia Corthron's A COOL DIP IN THE BARREN SAHARAN CRICK at Playwrights Horizons, who takes on a role originated by James Earl Jones. ." Written in response to THE BLACKS by Jean Genet, LES BLANCS is a deeply felt work that is as genuine as THE BLACKS is sardonic, reflecting on the thorny legacy of European influence in Africa. Harold Clurman, who saw the premiere production in 1971, called the play, "A forceful and intelligent statement of the tragic impasse between black and white relations all over the world.

Directed by Craig Baldwin, LES BLANCS features Charlie Barnett*, Keith Eric Chappelle*, Jeffrey Hayenga*, Graeme Malcolm*, Kevyn Morrow*, Judith Roberts*, Christina Rouner*, Graham Rowat* and Lindsay Smiling*. With Souleymane Yago on drums.

Direct Arts is a new intercultural company, dedicated to producing plays and films that explore the intersection between different cultures. This screening and staged reading is part of their monthly reading/screening series, Take Two. Taking place the second Tuesday every month, Take Two pairs a play and a film, one short and one feature-length, both touching on an analogous sociopolitial issue. In existence since 2007, Tale Two has featured the cream of NYC's multi-ethnic theater and film community - Obie Award winners, cable TV stars, Broadway actors, Sundance and Tribeca Film Festival picks, plus a motley assortment of downtown personalities. Direct Arts has received support from the Asian American Arts Alliance, the Puffin Foundation and Lower Manhattan Cultural Council for its work.

For more information, visit www.directarts.com.

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