This screen adaptation of Lorraine Hansberry’s award-winning play stars Claudia McNeil, Sidney Poitier, Ruby Dee, Diana Sands, Ivan Dixon, Louis Gossett, and Glynn Turman. Walter Lee Younger (Poitier) is a man with big dreams but he’s living within his modest realities. His father has just passed. And, despite being married, he lives in a two-bedroom apartment with his mother Lena, his sister Beneatha, his wife Ruth, and their young son Travis. The silver lining: his mother is waiting for her husband’s $10,000 life insurance check. Walter has a sense of entitlement to the money. He wants to invest in a liquor store. But Mama has religious objections to alcohol. Eventually, Mama puts some of the money down on a new house, choosing an all-white neighborhood over a Black one for the practical reason that its cheaper. Later she relents and gives the remaining $6,500 to Walter to invest, with the provision that he saves $3,000 for Beneatha’s education. A misguided Walter gives all the money to Willy, who takes it and flees, depriving Walter and Beneatha of their inheritance.

Before the screening, join us for a film introduction by Professor Mia Mask.