by Nathaniel R
Netflix announced yesterday that the next adaptation from August Wilson's Century Cycle will be his second Pulitzer winner The Piano Lesson. For those who thought Ma Rainey was way too stagey... well, you're not in luck! It's way too early to know how this will pan out given the pandemic and Broadway having been closed so long but this one is sticking even closer to the stage in a sense. The current plan is for Samuel L Jackson, Danielle Brooks (yay!!!) and John David Washington to play the central roles (and uncle and his niece and nephew) in the Broadway revival in 2022 and then go directly into filming the movie version when they're done. Having seen Danielle Brooks on stage in The Color Purple trust that Orange is the New Black barely scratched the surface of what she can do so this is exciting news for her fans.
The play, which centers on the theme of family legacies, is about a brother and sister in conflict over what to do about a family heirloom which has been connected to the family since the days when their great grandparents were slaves...
Alfre Woodard in the 1995 telefilm.
The Piano Lesson is, I believe, the only Wilson play that had been filmed prior to Fences. It was made into a TV movie by Hallmark back in 1995 with Alfre Woodard and Charles S Dutton Emmy-nominated in the roles that will now be played by Brooks and Washington. Woodard is of course still working (and just BAFTA nominated!) but Dutton (also a fabulous actor) appears to have retired since he hasn't made anything since playing Ma Rainey's husband in the Queen Latifah movie Bessie some years ago now. (I too was shocked to learn that Ma Rainey was married but they were separated by the time of the fictional events of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom)
For those who are unfamiliar with the Century Cycle, though I don't claim to be a Wilson expert (far from it), I can share the general overview. It consists of ten plays, each focusing on a decade of the 20th century and the African American experience. The plays were not written in chronological order and are also not arriving in the order they take place or were first staged. We've long since known that Denzel Washington plans to produce all ten. Perhaps it's smart to start with the most famous ones because if you start with the most famous and oft revived, people will feel familliar with the concept and eager for the ones that don't have as much name-recognition. If they continue with this "most famous first" tactic, Joe Turner's Come and Gone is obviously next and then maybe Jitney? I'm most curious about how they'll approach the casting of Seven Guitars and King Hedley II though since they share characters but not time frames.
If you took them in chronological order of the time periods they focus on they go like so:
- 1900s Gem of the Ocean
- 1910s Joe Turner's Come and Gone (Drama Critics Circle winner)
- 1920s Ma Rainey's Black Bottom
- 1930s The Piano Lesson (Pulitzer, Drama Desk, and Drama Critics Circle winner)
- 1940s Seven Guitars (Drama Critics Circle winner)
- 1950s Fences (Pulitzer, Tony, and Drama Desk winner)
- 1960s Two Trains Running (American Theatre Critics winner)
- 1970s Jitney (Olivier, Tony, and Drama Critics Circle winner)
- 1980s King Hedley II
- 1990s Radio Golf
All of the plays were nominated for Best Play at the Tonys with the exception of Jitney which received a Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play when it finally made it to Broadway. For non-theater geeks, how it works is you can compete for Revival even if its a show that's never been on Broadway before so long as the play itself is considered famous. Otherwise it tends to be considered a "new" play even if it has some years on it.
Are you familiar with The Piano Lesson? If so what do you make of the casting?