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Darlene Ortega's review for the Portland Observer of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival production of Lorraine Hansberry's The Sign in SIdney Brustein's WIndow notes that, "The play is so far ahead of its time that I wonder if we are ready even now for the prophetic insight of Ms. Hansberry, so famously young, gifted, and black. But I'm grateful that the Oregon Shakespeare Festival has gone to the trouble to offer us this opportunity."

Image of Lorraine Hansberry: Seeing Eyes/Feeling Heart official selection Toronto International FIlm Fesitival

Screening tonight in Toronto! On Friday, September 8, 2017, the world premiere of Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart, a documentary about playwright Lorraine Hansberry, opens as an OFFICIAL SELECTION at the Toronto International Film Festival.

Written and directed by Tracy Heather Strain, the film is narrated by award-winning actress LaTanya Richardson Jackson and features the voice of Tony Award-winning actress Anika Noni Rose as Lorraine Hansberry.

Lorraine Hansberry was the first African-American woman to have a play produced on Broadway, with “A Raisin in the Sun.”

Salamishah Tillet's essay, "For Lorraine Hansberry, 'A Raisin in the Sun Was Just the Start," discusses the upcoming debut of the documentary, Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart, noting Hansberry's commitment to the ongoing project of social change.

Daisy Bates and Lorraine Hansberry at “Village Rallies for NAACP,” in Washington Square Park, June 13, 1959.

Erin Trahan, for WBUR Boston, interviews Joi Gresham, the executive director of the Lorraine Hansberry Literary Trust, about the upcoming biopic, Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart.

Close-up portrait of Lorraine Hansberry.

On January 18, 2018, the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture of the New York Public Library will present, in partnership with American Masters PBS, an advance screening of the first feature-length documentary on playwright Lorraine Hansberry, Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart. Hansberry's “A Raisin In The Sun” was the first work by an African Am

Lorraine Hansberry during “impromptu song-session” at a SNCC fundraiser.

Join the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture librarians and archivists as they unveil their latest pop-up exhibition featuring items from our coveted collection of archival materials. Be the first to get up close and personal with selected items and enjoy an audience Q&A with the collection's curators. 

Image of Lorraine Hansberry and title of documentary, Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart

On Friday, January 19, the national broadcast premier of Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart, the first-ever feature documentary about Lorraine Hansberry, will be televised on PBS stations across the United States as part of their American Masters series (9pm EST on PBS; check local listings for more details).

In September 2017, the first-ever feature documentary, Lorraine Hansberry: Sighted Eyes/Feeling Heart, screened at the Toronto Film Festival; in January 2018, the film makes its television debut as part of the American Masters PBS series. Throughout 2018, the film will be joined by a number of new print biographies.

Lorraine Hansberry: Reimagining Biography: drawing by Hansberry with text below: March 22, 2018, Schomburg Center, NYC. Panel conversation with Margaret Wilkerson, Imani Perry, Soyica Colbert, Tracy Heather Strain. Moderated by Joy-Ann Reid.

Co-presented by the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture and the Lorraine Hansberry Literary Trust

 

WHEN
Thursday, March 22, 2018
Panel Discussion 6:30–8:00pm
Public Reception 8:00–9:00pm

WHERE
Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, 515 Malcolm X Blvd (135th St and Malcolm X Blvd), New York, NY, 10037

This is a free event but as space is limited, please RSVP here.

Seat reservations begin on Thursday March 8, 2018!

Photo of Reimagning Biography panelist Margaret WIlkerson

On March 22, 2018, the Lorraine Hansberry Literary Trust and the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture will co-present Lorraine Hansberry: Reimagining Biography. The four panelists will share how they navigated the feminisms, intersectionalities, political, and private-public voicings that shaped Hansberry’s life in their biographical treatments of the artist, activist, and public intellectual.

Over the next two weeks we will be sharing information about the panel participants as well as information about the Lorraine Hansberry Papers, held at the Schomburg Center. Today we are highlighting Margaret B. Wilkerson, author of Lorraine Hansberry: Am I a Revolutionary? (working title; forthcoming 2018/2019).