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FCC Hosts Driving Miss Daisy
Driving Miss Daisy by Hawthorne Players at Eagan Center in Nov.
(Special to the Independent News)
Hawthorne Players will present Alfred Uhry’s Pulitzer prize-winning play Driving Miss Daisy on Nov. 4, 5, 11, 12 at 7:30 p.m. and on Nov. 13 at 2 p.m. in the Florissant Civic Center Theatre. Tickets are $18 for adults, $16 for seniors/students and may be purchased by calling the Box Office at (314) 921-5678 or online at www.florissantmo.com.
The play is a warm-hearted, humorous, and moving study of the unlikely relationship between an aging, crotchety, white Southern lady, and a proud, soft-spoken African-American man. The pairing of the two begins when Daisy, a sharp-tongued Jewish widow, after one too many accidents, is forced to rely on the services of a chauffeur. The audience follows the two over a span of 25 years, as they, despite their mutual differences, grow ever closer to and more dependent upon each other.
The Hawthorne production stars Nancy Crouse as Daisy Werthan and Archie Coleman as Hoke Coleburn. Ken Clark portrays daisy’s son, Boolie. Trish Nelke directs.
Crouse notes that the play, set in the years 1948 to 1973, continues to be relevant today. At one point, Daisy says, “Isn’t it wonderful the way things are changing?” and Hoke replies that things are changing, but they haven’t changed all that much.
In Hawthorne’s 2012 production of Fences, Coleman gave an acclaimed performance as Troy Maxson, the embittered former baseball player. Coleman notes, “In that play we talked about fences being built around the characters. We have that in Uhry’s play, as well. Society has put fences around these people based upon race. For me this play is the story of two people deconstructing those fences and realizing they are just people. They both learn from each other.”
Not that it is an easy journey. Late in the story, Daisy tells Hoke, “You ought not to be driving anything, the way you see.” Hoke replies, “How you know the way I see, less you lookin’ out my eyes.”
The play presents challenges for the actors as they portray their characters over the three-decade period, requiring each to reveal changing personal and interpersonal relationships as well as physical decline. “It’s a welcome opportunity,” Crouse says. “Daisy is just the kind of role every actress loves to explore and bring to the stage, hoping to reveal the nuances of the human condition.”
Director Nelke anticipates that large audiences will come out for this very special, touching play. She says, “The characters in Driving Miss Daisy are universal figures; they are three people who are very different from each other and who could be anyone, anywhere – on a journey that is so much more than a few cars’ worth of road trips.”
