I got a role, you got a role, all of God's children got a role. A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry. Travis?
Wake up. Come on, Travis. It's 7.30.
Come on, you're not the only one to use the bathroom. And don't forget your clothes. Won't leave!
Let me see you do some waking up in there now. All right, just go ahead and lay there. Next thing you know, Travis will be finished in the bathroom, and Mr. Jones will be in there. Walter Lee, it's time for you to get up. You out yet?
What do you mean, out? You ain't hardly got in there good yet. What the hell are you doing all that yelling for if I can't even get in there yet? Check, coming today?
They said Saturday, and this is just Friday, and I hope to God you ain't gonna get up here first thing this morning and start talking to me about no money, because I probably don't want to hear it. Something the matter with you this morning? No, I'm just sleepy as the devil. What kind of eggs you want? Not scrambled.
Paper cone? Table. Set off another bomb yesterday. Did they?
What's the matter with you? Ain't nothing the matter with me. Now what is that boy doing in the bathroom all this time?
He just gonna have to start getting up early. I can't be late to work on account of him fooling around in there. Oh no, he ain't gonna be getting up no earlier, no such thing.
It ain't his fault that he can't get up no earlier nights cause he got a bunch of crazy good-for-nothing clowns sitting up here running their mouths in what is supposed to be his bedroom after ten o'clock at night. That what you mad about, ain't it? The things I want to talk about with my friends just couldn't be important in your mind, could they?
Why you always got to smoke before you eat in the morning? You look young this morning, baby. Yeah? Just for a second.
Stirring them eggs. You look real young again. Stop it.
It's gone now. You look like yourself again. Man, if you... don't shut up and leave me alone. First thing a man ought to learn in life is not to make love to no colored woman first thing in the morning.
Y'all some evil people at eight o'clock in the morning. Daddy, come on. Bathroom's free. I'm going.
I'm going. Sit down and have your breakfast, Travis. Mama, this is Friday. Check come tomorrow, huh?
You get your mind off money and eat your breakfast. This was the morning we were supposed to bring 50 cents into school. Well, I ain't got no 50 cents this morning.
Teacher said we have to. I don't care what teacher say. I ain't got it.
Eat your breakfast, Travis. You think Grandma would have it? No.
And I want you to stop asking your grandmother for money. You hear me? Golly, Ma. I don't ask her. She's getting it sometimes.
Travis, will it? Younger. I got too much on me this morning to be...
Maybe Daddy. Travis. Travis.
Could I maybe go carry some groceries in front of the supermarket for a little while after school then? Just hush, I said. If you're through eating, you can get over there and go make up your bed. I'm gone.
Get your jacket. Looks chilly out this morning. Get car fare and milk money and not a single penny for no caps.
You hear me? Yes, ma'am. Oh, mama makes me so mad sometimes.
I wouldn't kiss that woman goodbye for nothing in this world this morning. Not for nothing in this world. Now, who's the little old angry man are you?
Golly, Mama. Oh, golly, Mama. Get on out of here or you're going to be late. Can I please go carry some groceries?
Honey, it's starting to get so cold evening. What is it you want to do? Go carry groceries after school at the supermarket. Well, let him go. I have to.
She won't give me the 50 cents. Why not? Because we don't have it.
What you tell the boy things like that for? Here, son. Thanks, Daddy.
In fact, there's another 50 cents. Buy yourself some fruit today or take a taxi cab to school or something. Oh, please.
You better go now and get to school, man. Okay. Goodbye. Bye, honey.
That's my boy. You know what I was thinking about in the bathroom this morning? I know what you was thinking about. About what me and Willie Harris was talking about last night.
Willie Harris is a good-for-nothing loudmouth. Charlie Atkins was a good-for-nothing loudmouth too, wasn't he? When he wanted me to go into the dry cleaning business. this woman, and now he's grossing a hundred thousand a year, you still call him a loudmouth. Oh, what a lady.
You're tired, ain't you? Tired of everything. Me, the boy, the way we live, this beat-up hole.
But you wouldn't do nothing to help now, would you? Walter, please leave me alone. Mama would listen to you.
You know she'd listen to you more than she'd do me and Benny. She'd think more of you. All you have to do is just sit down with her when you're drinking your coffee and talk about things like you do and say easy like that you've been thinking about that deal Walter Lee's so interested in. About the stalling on and sip some more coffee.
Like what you're saying ain't really that important to you. And the next thing you know, she'd be listening good. And I'm like, what's going on? When I come home, I can tell her the details.
Now, this ain't no fly-by-night proposition, baby. I mean, we figured it out, me, Willie, and Bobo. Bobo? Yeah. You see, this liquor store we got in mind cost $75,000, and we figured the initial investment on the place be about $30,000, see?
That'd be $10,000 each. Eat your eggs. They're going to get cold. That's it. There you are.
Man say to his woman, I got me a dream. His woman say, eat your eggs. Man say, I got to take hold of this here world, baby. And he's...
These women say, eat your eggs and go to work. He say, I gotta change my life, I'm choking a deaf baby, and she say, your eggs is getting cold. Walter, that ain't none of our money.
This morning I was looking in the mirror and thinking about it. I'm 35 years old. I've been married 11 years, and I got a boy who sleeps in the living room. And all I got to give him is stories about how rich white people live. Eat your eggs, Walter.
Damn my eggs! Honey, you never say nothing new. So you would rather be Mr. Arnold than be his chauffeur. So I would rather be living in Buckingham Palace. That bathroom better be free.
Walter, don't start nothing with her now. Those Johnsons are forever in there. I'm going to start timing those people.
Dear sister, you should get up earlier. Really? Would you suggest, Dawn? Where's the paper? You're a horrible-looking chick at this hour.
Good morning, everybody. How is school coming? Lovely. Lovely. And, you know, biology is the greatest.
I dissected something that looked just like you yesterday. I just wondered if you'd made up your mind and everything. And what did I answer? yesterday morning and the day before that. Don't be so nasty, Benny.
And the day before that and the day before that. I'm interested in you. Something wrong with that?
Ain't many girls who decide to be a doctor. Right, that's it. Come on out of there, please. Walter Lee, just leave her alone and go to work. Benny, you know the check is coming tomorrow.
That money belongs to Mama, Walter, and it's for her to decide how she wants to use it. I don't- I don't care if she wants to buy a house or a rocket ship or just nail it up somewhere and look at it. It's hers. Not ours. Hers.
Now, ain't that fine? You just got your mother's interest at heart, ain't you, girl? You such a nice girl. But if Mama got that money, she can always take a few thousand and help you through school, too, can't she? I never ask anyone around here to do anything for me.
No, and the line between asking and just accepting when the time comes is big and wide, ain't it? What do you want from me, brother? That I quit school or just drop dead. Which?
I don't want nothing but for you to stop acting holy around here. Forgive me for ever wanting to be anything at all. Forgive me. Forgive me.
Please stop it. Your mama here. Who the hell told you to go be a doctor anyway?
I mean, if you're so crazy about messing around with sick people, then go be a nurse like other women. Or just get married and be quiet. Oh well, you finally got it said.
It took you three years, but you finally got it said. Hmm, Walter, give up, leave me alone. It's Mama's money.
He was my father too. So what? He was mine too and Travis's grandfather, but that insurance money belongs to Mama. Picking on me is not going to make her give it to you to invest in any liquor stores. And I for one say God bless Mama for that.
Ruth, did you see? Did you hear? Did you hear?
Honey, please go to work. Nobody in this house is ever going to understand me. Because you're a nut.
Who's a nut? You. V is mad, boy. The world's most backward race of people, and that's a fact. And then there are all those prophets who would lead us out of the wilderness and into the swamps.
Who got around here slamming doors at this hour? Walter Lee. He ain't been here, was that it again? My children and they tempers. Oh, Lord.
If this little old plant don't get more sun than it's been getting, it ain't never gonna... I want to see spring again. What's the matter with you this morning, Ruth? You look right peeped.
Beanie, honey, it's too drafty for you to be sitting around half-dressed. Where's your robe? In the cleaners.
Well, go get mine and put it on. I'm not cold, Mama, honest. I know, but you're so thin.
Oh, that's me. Bathroom's free. Lord have mercy, look at that poor bed.
Oh, bless his heart. He tries, don't he? No, he don't have to try at all, because he knows you're going to come along behind him and fix everything. Well, he a little boy, he ain't supposed to know about housekeeping.
My baby, that's what he is. What you fix for his breakfast this morning? I feed my son, Lena. I ain't meddling. I just noticed all last week he had cold cereal.
A child ought to have some hot grits or something when he goes out in the cold. I gave him hot oats. Is that all right?
I ain't meddling. Put a lot of nice butter on it. He likes lots of butter. Lena. What was they fighting about?
Now you know as well as I do. Walter's still wearing himself sick by that money. You know he is. You had breakfast? Some coffee.
Girl, you... You better start even looking after yourself better. You're almost thin as Travis.
Lena? Uh-huh? What you gonna do with it?
Now, don't you start, child. It's too early in the morning to be talking about money. it ain't Christian.
It's just that he got his heart set on that store. You mean that liquor store that Willie Harris wants him to invest in? Yes. We ain't no business people, Ruth.
We just plain walking folks. Nobody business people till they go into business. Mama. Something is happening between Walter and me.
I don't know what it is, but he needs something. Something I can't give him no more. He needs this chance, Lena.
Liquor, honey. I don't want that on my ledger this late in life. Ruth Younger, what's the matter with you today? You look like you could fall over right there. I'm just tired.
And you better stay home from work today. I can't stay home. She be calling up the agency and screaming at them. My girl didn't come in today. Oh, she just about had a fit.
Well, let's- I'll just call her up and say you got the flu. Why the flu? Because it sounds respectable to him.
Something white people get, too. I gots to go in. We need the money.
Child, we got a great big old check. coming tomorrow. Now that's your money. It ain't got nothing to do with me. We all feel like that, Walter and Benny and me, even Travis.
Ten thousand dollars. Sure is wonderful. You know what you should do, Miss Lena? You should take yourself a trip somewhere to Europe or South America or someplace.
Oh, Chot. I'm serious. Just pack up and leave. Go on away and enjoy yourself some.
Forget about the family and have yourself a... ball for once in your life. What I look like wandering around Europe by myself.
Shoot, these here rich white women do it all the time. They don't think nothing of packing up their suitcases and piling on one of them big steamships and swoosh, they gone, child. Something always told me I wasn't no rich white woman.
Well, what you gonna do with it then? I ain't rightly decided. Some of it got to be put away for Beneatha and her schooling.
Ain't nothing gone... untouch that part of it. Nothing. I've been thinking that we maybe could buy a little old two-story somewhere with a yard where Travis could play in the summertime.
If we use part of the insurance for a down payment and everybody kind of pitch in, I could maybe take on a little day work again, two days a week. Well, Lord knows we put enough rent into this here rat trap to pay for four houses by now. I remember the day me and Big Walter moved in here.
We wasn't planning on living here now more than a year. We was going to set away, little by little, don't you know, and buy a little place out in Morgan Park. We had even picked out the house. Looks right dumpy today, but Lord, child, you should know all the dreams I had about buying that house and fixing it up and making me a little garden in the back.
And didn't none of it happen? Yes. Life can be a barrel of disappointment sometimes. Honey, Big Walter would come in here some nights back then and just slump down on that couch there and just look at the rug, and I'd know he was down then. Really down.
And then, Lord, when I lost that baby, I almost thought I was going to lose big Walter, too. Oh, that man grieved himself. He was one man to love his children.
Nothing can tear at you like losing your baby. God knows there was plenty wrong with Walter Younger. Hard-headed, mean, kind of wild with women. Plenty wrong with him, but he sure loved his children. Always wanted them to have a baby.
to have something, be something. He was a good man, Mr. Younger. What could be so dirty on that woman's rugs that she has to vacuum them every single day? I wish certain young women around here would take inspiration.
How much cleaning can one house need, for Christ's sakes? Benny. Just listen to her.
Just listen. Oh, God. If you use the Lord's name just one more time. Oh, Mama. Fresh, just fresh as salt, this girl.
Well, if the salt loses its savor. Now, that will... do, Benny.
I just ain't gonna have you around here reciting the scriptures in vain. You hear me? How did I manage to get on everybody's wrong side by just walking into a room? If you weren't so fresh.
Ruth, I'm 20 years old. What time you home from school today? Kind of late. Madeline's gonna start my guitar lessons today.
Your what kind of lessons? Guitar. Oh, father. Lord, child.
How long it gonna be before you get tired of this now? Like you got tired of that little play acting group of yours? last year.
And what was it the year before that, Ruth? The horseback riding club. Why you got a flit soul from one thing to another, baby?
I just want to learn to play the guitar. Is there anything wrong with that? And I don't flit. I experiment with different forms of expression.
Like riding a horse? People have to express themselves one way or another. What is it you want to express? Me! Don't worry, I don't expect you to understand.
Who you going out with tomorrow night? George Murchison again Oh You getting a little sweet on him No, I like George alright, Mama I mean, I like him enough to go out with him and stuff What does and stuff mean? Mind your business Stop picking at her now, Ruth What does it mean? Oh, I just mean I can never really be serious about George He's so shallow What do you mean he's shallow? He's rich.
He knows it, too. Well, what other qualities a man gotta have to satisfy you, little girl? You wouldn't even begin to understand.
Anyone who could marry Walter could not possibly understand. Oh, Banny, hush your mouth. You mean you wouldn't marry George Murchison if he asked you someday? Honey, I knew you was odd. No, Ruth, I would not marry him if all I felt for him is what I feel now.
Besides, George's family wouldn't really like it. Why not? Oh, Mama, the Murchisons are honest to God, really. real life, rich colored people. And the only people in this world who are more snobbish than rich white people are rich colored people.
You must not dislike people cause they well off, honey. Why not? It makes just as much sense as disliking people cause they're poor and lots of people do that. Listen, I'm going to be a doctor. I'm not worried about who I'm going to marry yet.
If I ever get married. If? Oh, I probably will.
But first I'm going to be a doctor. And George, for one, still thinks that's pretty funny. I couldn't be bothered with all that.
I'm going to be a doctor, and everybody around here better understand that. Of course you're going to be a doctor, honey, God willing. God has got nothing to do with it. Benita, that just wasn't necessary.
Well, neither has God. I get sick of hearing about God. Benita! I mean it.
I'm just tired of hearing about God all the time. What's he got to do with anything? Does he pay tuition? You about to get your fresh little jaw slapped.
What? Why can't I say what I want around here like everybody else? Me and your father went to trouble to get you and brother to church every Sunday. Mama, you don't understand. It's all a matter of ideas, and God is just one idea I don't accept.
It's not important. It's just that I get tired of him getting the credit for all the things the human race achieves through its own stubborn effort. There simply is no blasted God.
There's only man, and it is he who makes miracles. No! Now, you stay after me. In my mother's house, there is still God.
There are some ideas we ain't gonna have in this house. Yes, ma'am. Not as long as I am head of this family. You think you're a woman, Benny, but you're still a little girl. What you did was childish, so you got treated like a child.
I see. I also see that everybody thinks it's all right for Mama to be a tyrant. But all the tyranny in the world will never put a God in the heavens.
So that I could hear somebody That frightens me, Ruth. My children. You got good children, Lena.
They just a little off sometimes, but they good. No. There's something come down between me and them that...
don't let us understand each other and I don't know what it is. You just got strong-willed children and it takes a strong woman like you to keep them in hand. They spirited all right, my children. I got to admit they got spirit, Betty and Walter.
About this little old plant that ain't never had enough sunshine or nothing. Look at it. You sure love that little old thing, don't you? Well, I always wanted me a garden like I used to see sometimes at the back of the houses down home.
Ruth! Good deal, don't bother to pray. Oh, we are young and by our self.
And a good deal, don't bother to pray. And a good deal, don't bother to pray. Yeah, hello?
Is Willie there? Benny, you better get over there behind the bureau. I seen the biggest cockroach marching out of there like Napoleon yesterday.
Hell, Willie, it ain't come yet. There really is only one way to get rid of him, Mama. It'll be here in a few minutes.
Did the lawyers give you the papers? Hell, set fire to this building. Good, good. I'll be right over. Where did Ruth go, Walter?
I don't know. I'll see you later. Where is he going? I don't know. Mama, where did Ruth go?
Oh, to the doctor, I think. The doctor? Well, what's the matter? You don't think...
Now I ain't saying what I think. But I ain't never been wrong about a woman, either. Yellow. Well, when did you get back?
And how was it? Yeah, of course I missed you. In my way. This morning? No.
No housecleaning and all that. Mama hates it if I let people come over when the house is like this. You have? Oh, well that's different.
What is it? Oh, what the hell. Come on over.
Right, I'll see you then. Who is that you inviting over here with this house looking like this? You ain't got the pride you was born with.
Asagai doesn't care what the house looks like, Mama. He's an intellectual. Who?
Asagai. Joseph Asagai. He's an African boy I met on campus. He's been studying in Canada all summer. He's from Nigeria.
Oh, that's that little country that was founded by slave way back. No, Mama, that's Liberia. I don't think I never met no African before. Well, do me a favor and don't ask him a whole lot of ignorant questions about Africans. I mean, do they wear clothes and all that?
Well, now, I guess if you think we're so ignorant around here, maybe you shouldn't bring your friends here. It's just that people ask such crazy things. All anyone seems to know about when it comes to Africa is Tarzan. But why should I know anything about Africa?
Why do you give money at church for the missionary work? Well, that's to help save people. You mean save them from heathenism? Yes. I'm afraid they need more salvation from the British and the French.
Well, I guess we're all the happy faces everybody knows. Ruth, you pregnant? Lord have mercy, I sure hope it's a little old girl.
Travis ought to have a sister. How far gone are you? Two months?
Did you mean to? I mean, did you plan it or was it an accident? What you know about planning or not planning? Oh, Mom.
She's 20 years old, Lena. Did you plan it, Ruth? Mind your own business. It is my business. Where's he gonna live?
On the roof? I didn't mean that. Ruth, honest.
Gee, I don't feel like that at all. I think it's wonderful. Wonderful? Ruth, honey.
Doctors say everything's gonna be alright. Yeah. She say everything's gonna be fine. She? What doctor you went to?
What's the matter with her, Mama? Of course she be alright. Women get right depressed sometimes when they give her wings. Now, Ruth, just relax.
That's right. Just lean back. Don't think about nothing at all. Nothing at all.
I'm all right. Oh, my God, that must be Asagai. Come on now, honey. You need to lie down and rest a while. Then have some nice hot food.
Hello, Aliyah. Hello. Welcome in. And please excuse everything. My mother was very upset about me letting anyone come here with a place like this.
You look disturbed, too. Is something wrong? Yes, we've all got acute ghetto-itis.
How was Canada? Canadian. I'm very glad that you're back.
Are you really? Yes, very. Why, you were quite glad when I went away.
What happened? You went away. Ah. Before you wanted to be so serious before there was time.
How much time must there be before one knows what one feels? What did you bring me? Open it and see.
Oh, Astakai, you got the robes for me? Oh, how beautiful, and the records, too. Oh, I shall have to teach you how to drape it properly.
Aha. Ah. Oh, Peggy! Oh, my Michelle! You wear it well!
Very well! Mutilated hair and all. My hair? What's wrong with my hair?
Were you born with it like that? No, of course not! How then? You know perfectly well how.
As crinkly as yours, that's how. And it is ugly to you that way? Oh, no, not ugly, but it's so hard to manage when it's, well, raw.
And so to accommodate that, you mutilate it every week. It's not mutilation. I'm only teasing you. Do you remember the first time you met me at school?
You came up to me and you said, and I thought you were the most serious little thing I'd ever seen. You said, Mr. Asagai, I want very much to talk with you about Africa. You see, Mr. Asagai, I'm looking for my identity. Yes. Well, it is true that this is not so much a profile of a Hollywood queen as perhaps a queen of the Nile.
But what does it matter? Assimilationism is so popular in your country. I'm not an assimilationist! Oh, such a serious one! So, you like the robes.
You must take excellent care of them. They are from my sister's personal wardrobe. Oh, you...
you sent all the way home? For me? For you, I would do much more. Well, that is what I came for.
I must go. Will you call me Monday? Yes, we have a great deal to talk about. I mean about identity and time and all that. Time?
Yes, about how much time one needs. to know what one feels. You never understood that there is more than one kind of feeling which can exist between a man and a woman or at least there should be.
No, no, between a man and a woman there need be only one kind of feeling. I have that for you now even right this moment. I know, and by itself it won't do. I can find that anywhere. For a woman it should be enough.
I know, because that's what it says in all the novels that men write, but it isn't. I'm not interested in being someone's little episode in America, or one of them. Ah, that's funny as hell, huh?
It's just that every American girl I have known has said that to me. White, black, in this you are all the same. It's how you can be sure that the world's most liberated women are not liberated at all. You all talk about it too much.
Oh. Oh, Mama, this is Mr. Asagai. How do you do? How do you do, Mrs. Younger?
Please forgive me for coming at such an outrageous hour on a Saturday. Well, you are quite welcome. I just hope you understand that our house don't always look like this. You must come again.
I would love to hear all about your country. I think it's so sad the way our American Negroes don't know nothing but Africa except Tarzan and all that. And all that money they pour into these churches. But they ought to be helping you people over there drive out them French and Englishmen and then take away your land.
Yes, yes. How many miles is it from here to where you come from? Many thousands.
I bet you don't have to look after yourself being away from your mama either. I spake you better come round here from time to time and get yourself some decent home-cooked meals. Thank you.
Thank you very much. Well, I must go. I will call you Monday, Alaio.
What's that he call you? Oh, Alaio. I hope you don't mind. It's what you would call the nickname, I think.
It's a Yoruba word. I'm a Yoruba. You didn't tell us what a lio means.
Well, I know you might be calling me a little idiot or something. Well, um, let me see. Just how to explain. The sense of a thing can be so different when it changes languages.
It means... It means one for whom bread, food, is not enough. Is that all right?
Thank you. Well, that's nice. You must come see us again, Mr...
Asagai. Yes. Do come again.
Goodbye. Goodbye. Lord, that's a pretty little thing just went out of here.
Yes, I guess I see why we don't commence to get so interested in Africa around here. Missionaries, my aunt Jenny. Oh, mama.
Me and my... Travis, baby, run next door and ask Miss Johnson to please let me have a little kitchen cleaner. I just came in. Do as you're told. Where you going, Benny?
To become the queen of the Nile. Oh Mary, don't you weep, don't you moan. Oh Mary, don't you weep, don't you moan. Lord, Pharaoh's army got down there. Oh Mary, don't you weep, don't you moan.
Oh, Ruth, who told you to get up? Ain't nothing wrong with me to be lying in no bed for. Where'd Benny go?
Far as I could make out, to Egypt. What time is it getting to? 10.20.
And that mailman gonna ring that bell this morning just like he done every morning for the last 15 years. Here. She said to tell you she didn't have much.
Lord, some people I could name is short, hot-fisted. Get down on the steps, boys. Yes, Mama.
You mean it done really come? Oh, Miss Lena. Well, I don't know what we all so excited about around here for. We known it was coming for months. That's a whole lot different from having it come and being able to hold it in your hand.
Is it here, Grandma? Lord. Oh, have mercy.
I wish Mona Lee was here. Open it, Grandma. Now, y'all be quiet. It's just a check. Open it.
Now, don't act silly. We ain't never been no people to act silly about no money. We ain't never had none before. Open it. Travis, is that the right number of zeros?
Yeah. $10,000. Grandmama, you rich? $10,000. Put it away somewhere, Ruth.
$10,000. What's the matter with Grandmama? Don't she want to be rich, Mama? You go on out and play now, baby. Mama.
Go on now. I expect if it wasn't for y'all, I would just put that money away or give it to the church or something. Don't upset yourself. Now, what kind of talk is that? Mr. Young would just be plain mad if he could hear you talking foolish like that.
Yes, he sure would. We got enough to do with that money, all right. Ruth, where did you go today, girl?
to the doctor now ruth you know better than that oh dr jones is strange enough in his way but there ain't nothing about him could make somebody slip and call him she like you done this morning well that's what happened my tongue slipped you went to see that Didn't you? What woman you talking about? That woman who gets...
Did it come? Can you give people a Christian greeting before you start asking about money? Ruth, did it come? Ten thousand dollars. Mama...
look old willie harris put everything on paper son i think you ought to talk to your wife i'll go on out and leave you alone i think you will somebody please listen to me today i don't allow no yelling in this house walter lee mama and you know it and there ain't gonna be no investing in no liquor stores and i don't aim to have to speak on that again Oh, so you don't aim to have to speak on that again. So you have decided. Well, you tell that to my boy tonight when you put him to sleep on the living room couch.
And tell it to my wife, Mama. Tomorrow when she has to go out there and look after somebody else's kids. And tell it to me, Mama. Every time we need a new pair of curtains and I have to watch you go out and work in somebody else's kitchen.
Yeah, you tell me then! Where you going? I'm going out. Where?
Just out of this house somewhere. I'll come too. I don't want you to come. I've got something to talk to you about, Walter.
That's too bad. Walter Lee, sit down. I'm a grown man, Mama. Ain't nobody said you wasn't grown, but you're still in my house and my presence.
And as long as you are, you'll talk to your wife, Sybil. Now, sit down. Oh, let him... go on out and drink itself to death. He makes me sick to my stomach.
And you turned mine too, baby. She was my greatest mistake. Walter, what is the matter with you? Matter with me? Ain't nothing the matter with me.
Yes, there is. Something eating you up like a crazy man. Something more than me not giving you this money. The past few years, I've been watching it happen to you. Mama, I don't need no nagging at me today.
Seem like you're getting to a place where you're always tied up in some kind of not-about-something. Ruth's a good, patient girl in her way, but you're getting to be too much. Boy, don't make the mistake of driving that girl away from you. Why? What'd she do for me?
She... loves you. Mama, I'm going out. I'm sorry about your liquor store, son.
It just wasn't the thing for us to do. That's what I wanted to tell you about. I've got to go out, Mama.
It's dangerous, son. What's dangerous? When a man goes outside his home to look for peace.
Then why can't there never be no peace in this house then? You done found it in some other house? No! There ain't no woman.
Why do women always think there's a woman somewhere when a man gets restless? Mama, Mama, I want so many things. Yes, son.
I want so many things that they are driving me kind of crazy. Mama, look at me. I'm looking at you. You're a good looking boy. You got a job, a nice wife, a fine boy.
A job? I open and close car doors all day. I drive a man around in his limousine and I say, Yes, sir. No, sir.
Very good, sir. Shall I take the drive, sir? That ain't no kind of job.
Ain't nothing at all. Mama, I don't know if I can make you understand. Understand what, baby? Sometimes it's like I can see the future stretched out in front of me. Just plain as day.
Just waiting for me. A big, looming, blank space full of nothing. Just waiting for me.
Sometimes when I'm downtown and I pass them cool, quiet-looking restaurants where them white boys are sitting back and talking about things, sitting there turning deals worth millions of dollars, sometimes I see guys don't look much older than me. Son, how come you talk so much about money? Because it is life, Mama. Oh, so now it's life?
Once upon a time, freedom used to be life. And now it's money? I guess the world really do change.
In my time, we was worried about not being lynched and getting to the North if we could and how to stay alive and still have a pinch of dignity, too. Now here you come and beneath her talking about things we ain't never even thought about hardly. Me and your daddy. You're my children? But how different we done become.
You just don't understand, mama. You just don't understand. Son, do you know your wife is expecting another baby? That's what she wanted to talk to you about. This ain't for me to be telling, but you ought to know.
I think Ruth is thinking about getting rid of that child. No, Ruth wouldn't do that. When the world gets ugly enough, a woman will do anything for her family.
The part that's already living. You don't know Ruth, Mama, if you think she would do that. Yes, I would too, Walter.
I gave her a five dollar down payment. Well, well, son. I'm waiting to hear you say something.
I'm waiting to hear how you be your father's son and say how we are people who give children life, not who destroys them, and say we don't give up one baby to poverty and that we ain't gonna give up a nary another one. I'm waiting to if you a son of mine, tell her you. You are a disgrace to your father's memory!
I've seen no Saba Trouble Live! got on tonight you are looking at what a well-dressed Nigerian woman wears What kind of dance is that? It's a folk dance.
What kind of folks do that, honey? It's from Nigeria. It's a dance of rock.
Who are you welcoming? The men back to the village. Where they been? How should I know? They've been out hunting or something.
Anyway, they're coming back now. Well, that's good. Yeah, Ethiopia Stripped off her hands again Yes, and Africa Sure is claiming her own tonight In my heart of hearts I am much worried In your heart of hearts You are much drunker Claiming speed Bam! That's it! Come and go CIA The line is a-waking A-waking away.
Oh, come a-gossier, Flaming Spear. Listen. Do you hear the screeching of the cocks in yonder hills for the coming of the mighty war? Oh, come a-gossier.
Hello, George. Come in. Thank you.
Do you hear the singing of the women? Singing war songs of our fathers and the babies? Oh, do you hear, my black brother?
Do you hear Flaming... Prepare for the greatness of the time. Black brother. Black brother, hell. Benita, you got company.
What's the matter with you? Waterly, younger, stop acting like a fool. Excuse me, I need the bathroom.
He's had a little to drink. I don't know what her excuse is. Look, honey, we're going to the theater.
We're not going to be in it. So go change, huh? You expect this boy to go out with you looking like that?
That's up to George. If he's ashamed of his hair. Why must you and your brother make an argument out of everything people say? Because I hate assimilationist Negroes.
Will somebody please tell me what assimilate whoever means? Oh, it's just a college girl's way of calling people Uncle Tom's. But that isn't what it means at all.
Well, what does it mean? It means someone who is willing to give up his own culture and submerge himself completely in the dominant and, in this case, oppressive culture. Oh, dear, here we go.
A lecture on the African past. Let's face it, baby. Your heritage is nothing but a bunch of raggedy ass spirituals and some grass huts.
Grass huts? See there? You are standing there in your splendid ignorance talking about people who were the first to smelt iron on the face of the earth. Danny, get in that room!
And Chained. The Ashanti were performing surgical operations when the English... Go on now. Were still tattooing themselves with blue dragons.
Have a seat, George. Warm, ain't it? I mean for September.
Would you like a nice cold beer? No, thank you. I don't care for beer.
I hope she hurries up. What time is the show? It's an 8.30 curtain.
That's just Chicago, though. In New York, standard curtain time is 8.40. Oh, you get to New York a lot?
A few times a year. Oh, that's nice. I've never been to New York.
New York ain't got nothing, Chicago ain't. Just a bunch of hustling people all squeezed up together for the end of Easter. Oh, you've been?
Plenty of times. Walt and Lee Young. Where's Mama Ruth? She ain't come back yet.
Well, we got to drink in this house. Why don't you offer the man some refreshments? Thank you. I really don't care for anything. How's your old man making out, George?
I understand you're all gonna buy that big old tail on the drive. Shrewd move. Your old man is alright.
I mean, he know how to operate. I mean, he thinks big. You know what I mean?
I'd like to talk to him. Listen, man, I got some plans that could turn this city upside down. It's hard to find a man on the whole South Side who understands my kind of thinking, you dig? Me and you ought to sit down and talk sometimes, man.
I got some ideas. Yeah, sometimes you'll have to do that, Walter. Yeah.
Well, when you get the time, man. I know you a busy little boy. Walter, please. I know ain't nothing in this world as busy as you colored college boys with your fraternity pins and your white shoes.
Oh, Walter Lee. I see you all the time. With the books tucked under your arms.
Filling up your heads with the sociology and the psychology. Are they teaching you how to be a man? How to take over and run the world?
No. Just to talk proper and read books and wear the faggoty looking white shoes. You're all whacked up with bitterness, man. And you?
Ain't you bitter, man? Ain't you just about had it yet? Don't you see no stars gleaming that you can't reach out and grab?
You happy? You contented son of a bitch. Are you happy? You got it made? Man, I'm a volcano!
Bitter! Here I am, a giant surrounded by ants. Ants who can't even understand what the giant is talking about!
Walter, ain't you with nobody? No! Because ain't nobody with me.
Not even my own mother. Walter, that's a terrible thing to say. Okay, let's go, George. Well, hey, you look great.
See y'all later. Have a nice time. Thanks.
Good night, Ruth. Good night, Prometheus. Who's Prometheus?
I don't know. Don't even worry about it. See there?
They get to a point where they can't insult you man to man. They gotta go talk about something ain't nobody never heard of. How you know it's an insult? Maybe Prometheus is a nice fellow.
Prometheus? I bet there ain't even no such thing. I bet that simple-minded clown...
Walter. Don't start. Start what?
Your nagging. Where was I? Who was I with? How much money did I spend?
Walter Lee, why don't we just try to talk about it? I've been out talking with people who understand me. I guess that means people like Willie Harris.
Yeah, people like Willie Harris. Why don't you all just hurry up and go on into the banking business and stop talking about it? You want to know why? Because we're all tied up in a race of people who don't know how to do nothing but moan, pray, and have babies. Oh, Walter, honey, why can't you stop?
fighting me who's fighting you who even cares about you well i guess i might as well go on a bit i don't know where we lost it but we have and i'm sorry about this new baby water i guess maybe i better go on and do what i started i just didn't realize how bad things was with us You want some hot milk? Hot milk? Yes. Why hot milk? Because after all that licking, you come home, where do you ought to have something hot in your stomach?
I don't want no hot milk. You want some coffee then? No, I don't want no coffee. I don't want nothing hot to drink.
Why are you always trying to give me something to eat? What else can I give you, Waterly Younger? It's been rough.
Ain't it, baby? How he gets to the place where we scared to talk softness to each other. Why you think it gotta be like that? Ruth, what is it gets in that people ought to be close? I don't know, honey.
I think about it a lot. The way something doesn't come down between us. There ain't so much between us, Walter. Not when you come to me and try to talk to me. Try to be with me.
A little, even. Sometimes, I don't even know how to try. Walter? Yeah?
Honey, life don't have to be like this. I mean, sometimes people can do things so that things are better. You remember how we used to talk when Travis was born?
About the way we were gonna live and the kind of house. Well, it's all starting to slip away from us. Woo! My, them steps is longer than they used to be. Oh!
Mama, where you been? How you feeling this evening, Ruth? Mama, where you been all day?
Where's Travis? I let him go out early and he ain't come back yet. Boy, is he gonna get it. Mama?
Yes, son. Where'd you go this afternoon? I went downtown to tend to some business that I had to tend to. What kind of business?
You know better than to question me like a child, Waller. Where were you, Mama? You didn't go and do something with that insurance money.
Something crazy. Mama, I can explain. Mama, I'm nothing. You're going to get it, boy. Get on in that bedroom and get yourself ready.
But I just... Why don't y'all never let the child explain himself? She's out of it now, Lena. A thousand times I've told you not to go off like that, Travis.
Well, at least let me tell him something. I want him to be the first one to hear. Come here, Travis.
Yeah, Ma? You know that money we got in the mail this morning? Yes, sir. Well, what you think your grandma gone and done with that money?
I don't know, Grandma. She went out and she bought you a house. What? You glad about the house?
It's gonna be yours when you get to be a man. Yeah, I always wanted to live in a house. All right, give me some sugar, man.
Mmm. Now, when you say your prayers tonight, you thank God and your grandfather, because it was him who gave you the house in his way. Now, you get on out of here and get ready for your beating.
Get on in there. So you went and did it. Yes, I did. Praise God.
Please, Walter, honey, let me be glad. You be glad too, old Walter, at home. A home.
Well, Lena, where is it? How big is it? How much are you going to cost?
Well... When are we moving? First of the month. Praise God!
Oh, Walter. It's a nice house, too. Three bedrooms. Nice big one for you and Ruth. Me and Benita still have to share our room, but Travis have one of his own.
And I figure if the new baby is a boy, we could get one of them double-decker outfits. Oh! And there's a yard with a little patch of dirt where I could maybe grow me a few flowers. And a nice big basement.
Walter, honey, be glad. Of course, I don't want to make it sound fancier than it is. It's just a plain little old house.
But it's made good and solid, and it will be ours. Walter Lee, it makes a difference when a man can walk on flowers that belong to him. Where is it?
Well, it... Well, it's out there in Clive-Om Park. Where?
406 Clive-Om Street, Clive-Om Park. Clive-Om? Mama, there ain't no colored people living in Clive-Om Park. Well, I guess there's gonna be some now. So that's the peace and comfort you went out and bought for us today.
Son, I just tried to find the nicest place for the least amount of money for my family. Well, of course there ain't. Well, I've never been afraid of no crackers, mind you, but, well, weren't there no other houses nowhere? Them houses they put up for colored in them areas way out all seem to cost twice as much as the other houses. I did the best I could.
Well, all I can say is that this is my time in life, my time, to say goodbye to these goddamn cracking walls and these marching roaches and this cramped little closet. but you ain't now or never was, no kitchen, then I say it loud and good, hallelujah, and goodbye, misery. I don't never want to see your ugly face again.
Lena? Yes, honey? Is there a whole lot of sunlight?
Yes, child, there's a whole lot of sunlight. Well, I guess I better see about Travis. Lord, I sure don't feel like whooping nobody today. Son, you...
You understand what I've done, don't you? I just see my family falling apart today. Just falling to pieces in front of my eyes.
We couldn't have gone on like we was today. We was going backwards instead of forwards. Talking about killing babies and wishing each other was dead.
When it gets like that in life, you just gotta do something different and push on out and do something bigger. I wish you'd say something, son. I wish you'd say how deep inside you think I done the right thing.
What you need me to say you done right for? You, the head of this family. You run our lives like you want to. It was your money and you did what you wanted with it. So what you need me to say it was all right for?
So you butchered up a dream of mine. You. He's always talking about your children's dreams. Walter Lee! Sometimes I'm up, sometimes I'm down.
Oh, yes, Lord. Sometimes I'm almost to the ground. Oh, there's so much packing to do.
Now, don't you fool with any of this stuff, Lena. Oh, Ruth, I just thought I'd sort a few things out. Is Walter here? Yes, in the bedroom. Is he?
Yes. Mrs. Johnson. Oh, hello there, Johnson. Hello there, yourself.
How are you this evening, Ruth? Fine, Mrs. Johnson. How are you?
Fine. Ain't you starting to poke out none yet, Ruth? Oh, ain't we getting ready right. I hear, Lord.
Yes, sir. Looky here. I'm telling you, the youngest is really getting ready to move on up a little higher. Bless God.
Bless God. He's good, ain't he? Oh, yes. He's good.
I mean, sometimes he works in mysterious ways, but he works, don't he? Yes, he does. I'm just so happy for y'all. Where's all the rest of the family?
Benny's gone to bed. Ain't. No sickness done hit her out. No, she just tired.
She was out this evening. Oh, ain't that lovely. She still going out with that little Murchison boy? That's lovely.
You sure got lovely children, young'un. Me and Isaiah talks all the time about what fine children you was blessed with. We sure do. Ruth, give Mrs. Johnson some sweet potato pie and milk. I guess y'all seen the news what's all over the colored paper.
this week no I didn't get mine yet this week you mean you ain't read about them colored people that was bombed out there place out there let me see ain't something how bad these here white folks is getting here in Chicago no getting so you think you're right down in Mississippi mmm cause I think it's wonderful how folks keep some pushing out You hearin' some of those Negroes round here talkin' about how they don't go where they ain't wanted and all that. But not me, Huntley. Wilhelmina Othellah Johnson goes anywhere, anytime she feels like it. Do you want some more pie?
No! No, thank you. Where's Walter?
He's lyin' down. Mmmmm. He sure gets his beauty rest, don't he?
Good looking man. I guess that's how come we keep on having babies right here. One thing about Walter, he always know how to have a good time.
And so ambitious. I bet it was his idea, y'all, moving out to Clydebourne Park. Lord, I bet this time next month you'll see all your names have been in the papers plenty.
Negroes invade Clydebourne Park, bombed. We ain't exactly moving out there to get bombed. Hello there, Betty.
Hello, Miss Johnson. High school? Fine, thank you.
Getting so she don't have much to say to nobody. The child was on her way to the bathroom. I know, but sometimes she act like she ain't got time to pass the time of day with nobody, ain't being to college.
Well, I guess I better go on home. Of course, I understand how she must be proud and everything, being the only one in the family to make something of herself. I know just being a chauffeur ain't never satisfied Walter, no. He shouldn't feel like it.
that, though. Ain't nothing wrong with being a chauffeur. There's plenty wrong with it. Why? Plenty.
My husband always said being any kind of servant wasn't a fit thing for a man to have to be. And my boy is just like him. He wasn't meant to wait on nobody. Hmm.
The young'uns is too much for me. You sure one proud acting bunch of colored folks. You know, me and you ain't never agreed about some things, Lena Younger. I guess I better go.
Good night. Good night. Oh, and you can keep the paper.
Night! Good night, Miss Johnson. If ignorance was gold, don't talk about folks behind their backs.
You do. I'm old and corrupted. You was rude to Miss Johnson, Denise, and I don't like it at all.
Mama, if there are two things we as a people have got to overcome, one is the Ku Klux Klan and the other is Ms. Johnson. Smart, Alec. Lord, ain't this a popular place tonight.
Hello? Hello, Mrs. Arnold. Yes, this is his wife speaking. Oh, he lying down now. He'll be in tomorrow.
He's been very sick. Yes, I know we should have called, but we were so sure he'd be able to come in today. I'm very sorry. Yes.
Thank you very much. That was Mrs. Arnold, Walter. What?
She said Mr. Arnold has had to take a cab for three days. Walter, you ain't been to work for three days. Where you been, Walter Lee Younger? You're gonna lose your job. That's right.
What have you been doing for these three days, son? Mama, you don't know all the things a man with leisure can find to do in this city. What's this, Friday night?
Well, Wednesday I borrowed Willie Harris' car and I went for a drive. And I drove and drove, way out, way past South Chicago. And I parked the car and I sat and looked at the steel mills all day long.
Then I drove back and I went to the Green Hat. And Thursday, Thursday I borrowed the car again and I drove the other way for hours, way, way up to Wisconsin. I looked at the farms and then I drove back and I went to the Green Hat.
And today, today I didn't get the car. Today I just walked all over the south side and I looked at the Negroes and they looked at me. I finally sat down on the curb at 39th and South Parkway and I just sat there and I watched the Negroes go by and then I went to the green hat.
Y'all sad? Y'all depressed? You know where I'm going right now.
Where you going Ruth? I'm going to bed. Oh big Walter, is this the harvest of our days? You know what I like about the Green Hat? I like this little cat they got there who blows a sax.
He blows. He talks to me. Yeah, but about five feet tall, and he got a conked head, and his eyes is always closed, and he's all music.
Won't hurt. And there's this other guy who plays the piano. They got a sound. I mean, they can work on some music.
They got the best little combo in the world in the Green Hat. I helped do it, too. You have now, son. Walter, I've been wrong. No, you ain't never been wrong about nothing, mama.
Listen to me now. I say I've been wrong, son. I've been doing to you what the rest of the world's been doing to you. Walter, what you ain't never understood is that...
I never really wanted nothing that wasn't for you. There ain't nothing as precious to me. There ain't nothing worth holding on to. Money, dreams, nothing else. If it means it's gonna destroy my boy.
I paid the man $3,500 down on the house. That leaves $6,500. Monday morning, I want you to take this money.
and take $3,000 and put it in a savings account for beneath his medical schooling. The rest, you put in a checking account with your name on it. And from now on, any penny that come out of it or that go in it is for you to look after, for you to decide.
It ain't much, but it's all I got in the world, and I'm putting it in your hands. I'm telling you to be the head of this family from now on, like you're supposed to be. You trust me like that, Mama?
I ain't never stopped trusting you, like I ain't never stopped loving you. The Charity for the Academy Home The Charity for the Academy Home The Charity for the Academy Home The Charity for the Academy Home The Charity for the Academy Home Son, I feel like talking to you tonight. About what?
Oh, about a lot of things, son. What you want to be when you grow up? A bus driver. A what?
Man, that ain't nothing to want to be. Why not? Because, man, it ain't big enough.
You know what I mean? In seven years, you're going to be 17 years old, and things are going to be very different for us. Now, I'll come home, home from my office downtown. You don't work in no office, Daddy.
No, but after tonight, after what your daddy's going to do tonight, there's going to be offices, a whole lot of offices. What you going to do tonight, Daddy? You wouldn't understand yet, son, but your daddy's going to make a transaction, a business transaction that's going to change our lives.
And that's how come one day when you're about 17 years old, I'll come home and I'll be pretty tired. You know what I mean? After a day of conferences and secretaries getting things wrong is the way they do. Because an executive life is hell, man.
And I'll pull the car up on the driveway and I'll come up the steps to the house and the garden will be clipping away at the hedges. And I'll say, hello, Jefferson. How are you this evening?
And I'll go inside and your mama will come dance. stairs and meet me at the door and we'll kiss each other. She'll take my arm and we'll go up to your room to see you sitting on the floor with the catalogs of all the great schools in America around you.
All the great schools in the world. And I'll say, all right, son, it's your 17th birthday. And what have you decided? Just tell me what it is you want to be and you'll be it whatever you want to be.
Yes, sir! Yes, sir! You just name it, son, and I'll hand you the work!
Hallelujah, Daddy! Good news, chariot's coming! But I don't want to leave the media! Oh, Benny, I meant to put a special note on that carton over there.
That's your mama's good china, and she wants him to be very careful with it. I'll do it. You know what I'm going to do as soon as I get in that new house?
What? Honey, I'm going to run me a tub of... water up the hip, and I'm gonna get in it, and I'm gonna sit and sit and sit in that hot water, and the first person who knocks to tell me to hurry up and come out. Get shot at, Sunrise.
You said it, sister. Honey, they ain't gonna read that from no airplane. I guess that I always think things have more emphasis if they're big somehow. You and your brother seem to have that as a philosophy of life.
Lord, that man done changed so round here. You know, you know what we did last- night me and Walter leave? What? We went to the movies. You know the last time me and Walter went to the movies together?
No. Me neither. That's how long it's been. But we went last night and we held hands. Oh Lord, you're killing me.
All right. Let's have some music in here. Oh.
Come on, honey, let's dance. Oh, stop it. Stop.
Talk about old-fashioned Negroes. What kind of Negroes? Old-fashioned.
You know, when these new Negroes have their conventions, beneath the younger is going to be the chairman of the committee of unending agitation race race race girl i do believe you are the first person in the history of the entire human race to successfully brainwash yourself i can just see that chick someday looking down at some poor cat on an operating table before she starts to slice him saying by the way what are your views on civil rights down there Well, sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt. Hello. How do you do, miss? I'm looking for Mrs. Lena Young.
Oh, yes, that's my mother. Excuse me. Ruth, brother, somebody's here.
Come in, please. Thank you. My mother isn't here just now. Is it business?
Yes, well, of a sort. Have a seat. I'm Mrs. Yonder's son.
I look after most of her business matters. Well, my name is Carl Linder. This is my wife.
Hello. And my sister. How do you do?
What can I do for you, Mr. Linder? Well, I am a representative of the Clyburn Park Improvement Association. Why don't you sit your fangs on the floor?
the floor. Oh, yes. Thank you.
Well, as I was saying, I am from the Clyburn Park Improvement Association and we have had it brought to our attention that you people, or at least your mother, has bought a piece of residential property at 406 Clyburn Street. That's right. You can't present a drink.
Ruth, get Mr. Lindner a beer. Oh, no, no, no, really. I mean, thank you very much, but no, no, no, no, no, thank you.
Some coffee? No, no, thank you. Nothing. at all.
Well, I don't know how much you folks know about our organization. It's one of those community organizations set up to look after, well, you know, things like block upkeep and special projects. And we also have what we call our new neighbor's orientation committee.
Yes? And what do they do? Well, it's what you might call a sort of welcoming committee, I guess.
I'm the chairman of the committee and I go around and... and see the new people who move into the neighborhood and sort of give them the lowdown on the way we do things out in Clyburn Park. And we also have the category of what the association calls, uh, uh, special community problems. Yes, and what are some of those? Benny, girl, let the man talk.
Oh, well, thank you. I would sort of like to explain this thing in my own way. Go ahead. Well, to get right to the point, uh...
I'm sure you people must be aware of some of the incidents which have happened in various parts of the city when colored people have moved into certain areas. Well, not only do we deplore that kind of thing, but we are trying to do something about it. We feel that most of the trouble in this world, when you come right down to it, exists because people just don't sit down and talk to each other.
You can say that again, mister. We don't try hard enough in this world to understand... the other fellow's problems, the other guy's point of view. Now, that's right.
Yes, yes, that's the way we feel out in Clyburn Park, and that's why I was elected to come here this afternoon and talk to you people, friendly-like, you know, the way people should talk to each other, and see if we couldn't find some way to work this thing out. What do you mean? Well, you see, our community is made up of people who've worked hard as the dickens for years to build up that little community.
And at the moment, the overwhelming majority of us feel that people get along better or take more of a common interest in the life of the community when they share a common background. I want you to believe me when I tell you that race prejudice simply doesn't enter into it. It is a matter of the people of Clyburn Park.
believing that for the happiness of all concerned that our Negro families are happier when they live in their own communities. This, friends, is the welcoming committee. Is this what you came marching all the way over here to tell us?
Well, now, we've been having a fine conversation. I hope you'll hear me all the way through. Go ahead, man. You see, in the face of all the things I have said, we are prepared... To make your family a very generous offer.
Yeah? Our association is prepared through the collective effort of our people to buy the house from you at a financial gain to your family. Lord have mercy, ain't this a living gall.
All right. You through? Well, I want to give you the exact terms of the financial arrangement. I don't want to hear no exact terms of no arrangement. I want to know if you got any more to tell us about getting together.
Well, I don't suppose that you feel... Never mind how I feel. You got any more to say about how people ought to sit down and talk to each other?
Get out of my house, man. Well, I don't understand why you people are reacting this way. Well, what do you think you are going to gain by moving into a neighborhood where you just aren't wanted?
And where some elements, well, people can get... awful worked up when they feel that their whole way of life and everything they've ever worked for well i'm sorry it went like this get out here take my card you just can't force people to change their hearts son There's a ticket here Well, Travis You see, when we go out, it's all the packing that got done since we left out of here this morning. I testified before God that my children got all the energy of the dead.
What time the moving men do? Four o'clock. You had a caller, Mama. Sure enough, who? The welcoming committee.
Who? The welcoming committee. They said they sure is going to be glad to see you when you get there. Yeah, they said they hardly can't wait to see your face. What's the matter with y'all?
Ain't nothing to do with us. We're just telling you about a gentleman who came to see you this afternoon from the Clybourne Park Improvement Association. Well, what'd he want? To welcome you, honey.
He said they can't hardly wait. He said the one thing they don't have that they are just dying to have out there is a fine family of colored people. Ain't that right? Yeah. Yeah.
He left his card just in case. Oh, Father, give us strength. Did he threaten us? Oh, Mama, they don't do it like that no more.
He talked brotherhood. He said everybody ought to learn how to sit down and hate each other with good Christian fellowship. Lord protect us. You should hear the money those folks raised to buy the house from us. All we paid and then some.
What do you think we're going to do, eat them? No, honey, marry them. Well, that's the way the crackers crumble.
Mama, what are you doing? Fixing my plan so it won't get hurt. None on the way. Mama, you gonna take that to the new house?
Uh-huh. That raggedy looking old thing? It expresses me. Come here, Mama.
Oh, look out now, boy. You're gonna make me mess up my thing here. Mama, you know what it means to climb up into the cherry?
Get away from me now. What that old song say, Mama? I got wings, you got wings, all the child children got wings.
Boy, get out of my face and... through some work. Everybody talks about heaven ain't going there. I don't know. You think we ought to give her the present?
Seems to me she ain't being very appreciative. around here. What is that? Well, what do you think?
Should we give it to her? Oh, she was pretty good today. Good you.
Open it, Mama. Open it, Mama. It's for you.
Gardening tools. Oh, my. Ruth made up the note.
Read it. To our own Mrs. Miniver, love from Walter, Ruth, and Benita. Ain't that lovely?
Dad, can I get a mind now? All right, son. Travis didn't want to go in with the rest of us, Mama.
He got his own. We don't know what it is. Here, Grandma. Oh, Lord have mercy, baby. Open it, open it.
Travis honey what is that? It's a gardening hat. Like the ladies always wear in the magazines when they're doing their gardens.
Travis, we're trying to make Mama Mrs. Miniver not Scarlett O'Hara. What?! What's the matter with y'all? This here's a beautiful hat.
I always wanted me one just like it. Oh, bless your heart, Travis. This is the prettiest hat I ever owned.
Oh, that couldn't be the movers. It's not hardly two yet. Wait, wait, I'll get it. I'm going to go and pack my books.
You expecting company, son? Yeah, yeah. Well, let them in, son. We're going to need some more string. Oh, Benny, I think you got some string in a box under the bed.
Travis, come on. We got to pack your clothes. Why don't you answer the door, ma'am? Because sometimes it's hard to let the future begin. I got...
You got wings, you got wings, all of God's children got wings. Where's Willie, man? He ain't with me. Oh. Come on in.
You know my wife? Yes. How are you, Miss Ruth? Hello, Bobo. You were right on time today.
Right on time. That's the way. See, now, let me hear. Could I please get a drink of water before I tell you that Walter Lee, Ruth, ain't nothing wrong, is there? Let me tell you, man, nothing go wrong.
Let me tell you, Walter Lee. Here you go. I gotta tell you how it was.
I mean, first I gotta tell you how it was all the way. I mean about the money I put in, Walter Lee. What about the money you put in?
Well, it wasn't as much as we told you. Me and Willie. I'm sorry, Walter. I got a bad feeling about it. I got a real bad feeling about it.
Ma'am, what are you telling me all about this for? Tell me what happened in Springfield. Springfield.
What was supposed to happen in Springfield? This deal. The deal that me and Walter went into with Willie, well, me and Willie was going to go down to Springfield, spread some money around so we wouldn't have to wait so long for the liquor license. That's what we were going to do.
Everybody said that was the way you had to do it. You understand this rule? Man, what happened down there? I'm trying to tell you, Walter. Then tell me, goddammit!
What's the matter with you? Man, I didn't go to no Springfield yesterday. Why not? Because I didn't have no reason to.
Man, what are you talking about? I'm talking about the fact that when I got the train to the station yesterday morning, 8 o'clock, like we planned, man, Willie didn't never show up. Why? Where was he?
Where is he? That's what I'm trying to tell you. I don't know.
I waited six hours. I called his house and I waited in that train station six hours. That was all the extra money I had in the world.
Man, Willy's gone. Gone. What you mean Willie's gone? Gone where?
You mean he went by himself? You mean he went off to Springfield by himself to take care of getting the license? You know Willie got his own ways. Maybe you was late and he just went on down there without you. Maybe, maybe he's been calling you at home trying to tell you what happened or something.
Maybe he just got sick. He's somewhere. He got to be somewhere. We just gotta find him.
Me and you, we gotta go and find him. We got to! What's the matter with you all?
When a cat take off with your money? He don't need no map. Willie. Willie. Don't do it.
Please don't do it, man. And please, not with that money. Oh, God. Don't let it be true. Man, I trusted you.
Man, I put my life in your hands. Man, that money was made out of my father's flesh. Have my wife speak on this deal too? Son, son, is it gone? Son, I gave you $6,500.
Is it gone? All of it? Beneath his money, too? Mama? I never went to the bank at all.
You mean your sister's school money? You used that too? Walter? Yes.
Oh, it's all gone. No, no, no, no. My mother, please. I seen him night after night. I seen him grow thin and old before he was 40. Working and working and working like somebody's old horse.
Killing himself. You. You give it all away in a day. Oh God.
Look down here. And show me the strength. Mama.
Strength. Mama, come on. Strength. The trouble I've seen, nobody knows my sorrow.
Nobody knows the trouble I've seen. Glory, Halle. I had some free time. I thought I might help with the packing.
I like the look of packing crates. Household in preparation for a journey. It depresses some people, but for me it is something full of the flow of life.
You understand? Movement. Progress.
You gave away the money, Asagai. Who gave away what money? The insurance money. My brother gave it away.
He made an investment with a man even Travis wouldn't have trusted. And it's gone? Gone.
I'm very sorry. And you, now? Me?
Me? Me, I'm nothing. Me. When I was very small...
We used to take our sleds out in the wintertime and slide downhill all day. And it was very dangerous, you know, far too steep. Sure enough, one day this kid named Rufus, he came down too fast and hit the sidewalk. We saw his face just split open right there in front of us. And I remember standing there looking at his bloody open face thinking, that was the end of Rufus.
But then the ambulance came and they took him to hospital and they fixed up his broken bones and they sewed it all up. And the next time I saw Rufus, he just had a little line down the middle of his face. I never got over that.
What? That that was what one person could do for another. Fix them up. Sew up the problem and make them whole again.
This was truly being God. You wanted to be God. No, I wanted to cure. It used to be so important to me. I wanted to cure.
It used to matter. I used to care. I mean about people and how their bodies hurt.
And you stopped caring? Yes, I think so. Why?
It was a child's way of seeing things. Or an idealist's. Children see all things very well sometimes. And idealists even better. I know that's what you think.
Because you were still where I left off. You with all your talk and dreams of Africa. You still think you can patch up the world with all your talk of independence.
Yes. And what about all the crooks and thieves and just plain idiots who will come into power and steal and... plunder are the same as before, only now they will be black and do it in the name of the new independence.
What about them? That will be a problem for another time. First, we must get there. And where does it end?
End. An end to the misery, the stupidity. While I was sleeping in my bed, things were happening in the world that directly concerned me. They just went out and did things and changed my life.
Don't you see there isn't any real progress, Asagai? There is only one large circle that we just march around and around, each of us with our own little picture in front of us, our own little mirage of what we think is the future. That is a mistake. What? It isn't a circle.
It is simply a long line. As in geometry, you know, one that reaches into infinity. And because we cannot see the end, we also cannot see how it changes.
Man is foul, and the human race deserves its misery. And the truth is that people are puny, small, and selfish. Truth!
Why is it that you despairing ones always think that only you have the truth? You talk about what good is struggle, what good is anything? Where are we all going?
And why are we bothering? And you can't answer it! I live the answer. In my village at home, it is the exceptional man who can even read a newspaper, or whoever sees a book at all. I will go home, and much of what I will have to say will seem strange to the people of my village.
But I will teach and work, and things will happen, slowly and swiftly. And perhaps, perhaps I will be a great man. I mean... Perhaps I will hold on to the substance of truth and find my way always with the right cause. And perhaps for it I will be butchered in my bed some night by the servants of the Empire.
You're all the martyr. Or perhaps the things I believe now for my country will be wrong and outmoded, and I will not understand and will just want power. Don't you see that there will be young men and women, my own black countrymen, to step out of the shadows some evening as slit by then useless throat?
Don't you see they have always been there? And that such a thing as my own death will be an advance. They who might kill me even actually replenish me.
Oh, Asagai, I know all that. Good. Then tell me what you plan to do. Do?
I have a bit of a suggestion. What? That when it is all over, that you come home with me. Asagai.
At this moment you decide to be romantic? Oh, my dear, young creature of the new world, I do not mean across the city, I mean across the ocean, home to Africa. To Nigeria?
I will show you our mountains and our stars, and give you cool drinks from gourds, and teach you the old songs and the way of our people. And in time, we will pretend that... You have only been away for a day. You're getting me all mixed up.
Why? Too many things. Too many things have happened today. I must sit down and think. I don't know what I feel about anything right this minute.
All right. I shall leave you. Just sit a while and think.
Never be afraid to sit a while and think. How often have I looked at you and said, ah, so this is what the new world hath finally wrought. The blind man stood on the rolling... Well, ain't it a mess in here though.
I guess we all better stop moping around and get some work done. All this unpacking and everything we gotta do. Benny, call the moving people and tell them not to come.
Tell them not to come, Mama? Of course, baby. Ain't no need for them coming all the way here and having to go back.
They charges for that too. But Miss Lena. Lord.
Ever since I was a little girl, Ruth, I always remember people saying, Lena, Lena Eggleston, you aims too high all the time. You need to slow down and see life a little more like it is. That's what they always used to say to me down home.
Lord, that Lena Eggleston is a high-minded thing. She'll get her due one day. No, Lena. Me and Big Walter just didn't ever learn right.
Lena, no. No, we gotta go. Benny, tell her we can still move. The note say about 125 a month. We got four grown people in this house.
We can work. Just aim too high all the time. Lena, Lena, I'll work. I'll work 20 hours a day in all the kitchens in Chicago. I'll strap my baby on my back if I have to and scrub all the floors in America and wash all the sheets in America if I have to.
But we gots to move. We gots to get on out of here. No, I see things differently now. Been thinking about some of the things we could do to fix this place up some. I seen a secondhand boo-ro over on Maxwell Street just the other day that could fit right there.
Sometimes you just got to know where to give up some things and... Hold on to what you got. Where you been, son?
Made a call. To who, son? To the man.
What man, baby? The man, mama. Don't you know who the man is? Walter Lee? Like the guy say on the streets, the man, Captain Boss, Mr. Charlie, old Captain Please, Mr. Boss Man.
Linda. That's right. That's good.
I told him to come right over. For what? What do you want to see him for?
We're gonna do business with them. What you talking about, son? Talking about life, mama.
You always telling me to see life like it is. Who gets and who don't get, mama. You know it's all divided up. Life is, sure enough, between the takers and the tooken. I finally figured it out!
Yeah! People like Willie Harris, they don't never get tooken. And you know why the rest of us do? We all mixed up, mixed up bad.
We get to looking around for the right and the wrong. We worry about it and cry about it. And all the time, man, them takers is out there operating, just taking and taking.
But I'll say one thing for old Willie Harris. He taught me something. He taught me to keep my eye on what counts in this world.
Yeah! Thank you, Willie! You talking about taking them people's money to keep us moving to that house?
I ain't just talking about it, baby. I'm telling you that's what's gonna happen. Oh, God, where is the bottom? Where is the real honest-to-God bottom so we can't go any further?
You and that boy that was here today, you all want everybody to carry a flag and a spear and sing some marching songs, huh? You want to spend your life looking into things and trying to find the right and the wrong part, huh? Yeah!
You know what's gonna happen to that boy someday. He's gonna find himself sitting in a dungeon, locked in forever, and the takers will have the key! Forget it, baby! There ain't no causes! There ain't nothing but taking in this world, and he who takes the most is the smartest.
And it don't make a damn bit of difference how! You make something inside of me cry, son. Some awful...
pain inside me don't cry mama understand white man is gonna walk in that door able to write checks for more money than we ever had it's important to him and i'm gonna help him i'm gonna put on a show mama son i come from five generations of people who were slaves and sharecroppers But ain't nobody in my family never let nobody pay him no money. That was a way of telling us we wasn't fit to walk the earth. We ain't never been that poor. We ain't never been that dead inside. Well, we all dead now.
All the talk about dreams and sunlight that goes on in this house. All dead. What's the matter with you all? I didn't make this world. It was given to me this way.
Hell yeah, I want me some yachts someday. Yeah, I want to hang some real pearls around my wife's neck. Ain't she supposed to wear no pearls? I tell you, I'm a man, and I think my wife should wear some pearls in this world. Baby, how you gonna feel on the inside?
Fine. I'm gonna feel fine. You won't have nothing left then, Walter Lee.
I'm gonna feel fine, Mama. I'm gonna look that son of a bitch in the eyes and I'm gonna say, I'm saying, all right, Mr. Linder, that's your neighborhood out there. You got the right to keep it like you want. You got the right to have it like you want. Just write the check and the house is yours.
And you, you people just put that money in my hand and you won't have to live next to this bunch of stinking niggas. Maybe, maybe I'll just get down on my black knees. Can't miss the boss, man.
Yes, sir. Great white father, just give some of the money for God's sake, and we ain't gonna come out there and dirty your white folks' neighborhood. That is not a man. That is nothing but a toothless rat.
Yes, death done come in this here house. Don't come walking in my house on the lips of my children. You were supposed to be my beginning again. You, Benny, you mourning your brother.
He's no brother of mine. What'd you say? I said that that individual in that room is no brother of mine.
You feeling like you better than he is today. What'd you tell him a minute ago? That he wasn't a man? You done wrote his epitaph.
too like the rest of the world? Well, who give you the privilege? You saw what he just did, Mama.
You saw him down there on his knees. Wasn't it you who taught me to despise any man who would do that? What he's going to do. Yes, I taught you that, me and your daddy.
But I thought I taught you something else, too. I thought I taught you to love him. There's nothing left to love.
There is always something left to love. And if you ain't learned that, you ain't learned nothing. Have you cried for that boy today? I don't mean for yourself and for the family because we lost the money.
I mean for him. What he been through and what it done to him. Child, when do you think is the time to love somebody the most? When they done good and made things easy for everybody?
Well, then you ain't through learning, because that ain't the time at all. It's when he's at his lowest and can't believe it himself, because the world done whipped him so. When you start measuring somebody, measure him right, child.
Measure him right. Make sure you done take it into account what hills and valleys he come through before he got to wherever he is. Grandma, the moviemen are downstairs. The truck just pulled up. Are they, baby?
They downstairs? Uh, hello? Walter is here. Well, I certainly was glad to hear from you people.
Mr. Leonard? Life can really be so much simpler than people let it be most of the time. Well, with whom do I negotiate?
You, Mrs. Younger, or your son here? Travis, you go downstairs. No, Travis, you stay right here.
And you make him understand what you're doing, Walter Lee. You teach him good, like Willie Harris taught you. You show where our five generations done come to. Go ahead, son.
Well, Mr. Lindner, we called you because... Well, me and my family, well, we are very plain people. Yes.
I mean, I've worked as a chauffeur most of my life. And my wife here, she does domestic work in people's kitchens. So does my mother. Yes, Mr. Younger. And, uh, well, my father.
He was a laborer most of his life. Oh, yes. My father almost beat a man to death once because he called him a bad name or something.
You know what I mean? No, I'm afraid I don't. Well, what I mean is that we come from people who had a lot of pride. And that's my sister over there.
She's gonna be a doctor. And we are very proud. Well, I'm sure that's very nice, but... What I'm telling you is that we called you over here to tell you that we are very proud and that this is...
This is my son, who makes the sixth generation of our family in this country. And that we have thought about your offer, and we have decided to move into our house. Because my father, my father, he earned it. We don't want to make no trouble for nobody or fight no causes.
We will try to be good neighbors. And that's all we got to say. We don't want your money. I take it, then, that you have decided to occupy.
That's what the man said. Then I would like to appeal to you, Mrs. Younger. You're older and wiser and understand things better, I'm sure.
I'm afraid you don't understand. My son... son said we was going to move, and there ain't nothing left for me to say.
You know how these young folks is nowadays, mister. Can't do a thing with them. Goodbye.
Well, if you're that final about it, there's nothing left for me to say. I sure hope you people know what you're doing. Well.
For God's sake, if the movie matter here, let's get the hell out of here. Oh, look at all this hair mess. Ruth, put Travis Goodjacket on him.
Walter Lee, fix your tie and tuck your shirt in. You look just like somebody's oodler. Lord have mercy, where is my plan?
Oh no, you all start on down. Travis, child, don't go empty handed. Oh, Ruth, where did I put that box with my skillets in it? Oh, here.
Thank you, honey. I want to be in charge of it myself. I'm going to make us the biggest dinner we ever ate tonight.
Vanessa, what's the matter with them stockings? Pull them things up, girl. Mama, Ursula asked me to marry him today and go to Africa.
He did? You ain't old enough to marry nobody. Darling, that ain't no bale of coffee.
Please handle it so we can sit in it again. Sorry, ma'am. I'm the best here. I had that chair 25 years ago. To go to Africa?
Mama, be a doctor in Africa. Yes, baby. Africa?
What do you want to go to Africa for? To practice there. Girl, if you don't get them silly ideas out your head, you better marry yourself a man with some loot.
What have you got to do with who I marry? Lenny, now I think George Merkinson would be a perfect match for you. Well, you marry him, then. Well, I ain't going to marry him. I'm a man.
What's wrong with you? Yeah, there's something all right, my children. Yeah, there's something.
Let's go. lena yep i'm coming ruth yes he finally come into his manhood today didn't he kind of like a rainbow after the rain yes lena coming My plan, my plan. Oh, Lord.
I got a robe, you got a robe, all of God's children got robes. When I get to heaven, I'm gonna put on my robe, I'm gonna wear it all over Everybody talking about heaven ain't going there. Heaven, heaven, I'm gonna wear it all over.
Mama was played by Donna Crowe. Walter was Danny Spanning. Ruth, Nadine Marshall.
Beneath her... Lenora Critchlow, and Travis was Shagon Fawale. Asagai and Bobo was Jude Awudike. Mrs. Johnson was Cecilia Noble.
Linda was Sean Baker. And George was Richard Pebble. A Raisin in the Sun was written by Lorraine Hansberry and directed by Pauline Harris.
Heaven, I'm gonna walk all over God's heaven.