The summary for “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” on the Carmel Community Players (CCP) website reads, “A progressive white couple’s proud liberal sensibilities are put to the test when their daughter brings her black fiancé home to meet them in this fresh and relevant stage adaptation of the iconic film.”
While the story takes place in the late 1960s, it addresses many topics that are just as relevant today. From the relationships of parents with their adult children, through the sobering difficulty of having your stated beliefs challenged by your own actions and attitudes, to the idea that love can be blind to anything that does not fit the lover’s view of reality, this is a play with a message for a large audience.
You can see CCP’s production of “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner” at the Cat, 254 Veterans Way, Carmel, for seven nights in the next two weeks.
According to CCP Director Jan Jamison, she chose this play in large part due to her love of the original 1967 movie it is based on.
“I have always loved this movie because of the acting from Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn,” Jamison told The Reporter. “They were in love. Everybody knew it. He was married to someone else, but that’s the way that goes. He died like two-and-a-half weeks after this movie came out in 1967. There is a lot of history to it. He is marvelous in the movie and the emotions on both of their faces are so real. I said if there was ever a stage play, I wanted to look at it.”
After Indiana Repertory Theatre staged it as part of its season two years ago, Jamison began asking if it was available for community theater. Once that was finally true, she “snapped it up.”
According to Jamison, “It was 1967 and a lot of that racial inequality was still very prevalent. Sometimes it is today, unfortunately. This story is still very relevant in areas today. It is written for white people to see. It is even mentioned in the show, ‘If he came in here and he was intelligent and education and handsome and charming and well-learned and famous he was white would that make any difference to you?’ That’s exactly what the story wants to get across. It’s not the color of skin that should matter.”
Onis Dean, who plays the character Dr. Prentice, the black man brought to dinner to meet his white fiancée’s family, has been involved in theater for approximately 15 years and says he can connect with his role on many levels.
“I connect with this role on a lot of different levels,” Dean said. “I like to consider myself educated. Growing up my own father was on me all the time making sure I made the grades. I feel like you get a lot of that with Dr. Prentice. He feels like he is living under the pretense of what his father wants him to be. It seems like sometimes no matter what he does he can’t make him fully happy. I think there are moments in my life I have felt that way. As I got older, I have been able to have those conversation. Mine didn’t end up quite as crazy as his situation. Also, I grew up going to a predominantly white school and dated white girls. It wasn’t as frowned up as it obviously is in this story, but you still did get looks from time to time from people.”
While mixed-race relationships have become more prevalent and racial tension is not nearly what it was in 1967, in recent years we hear more and more about incidents of racial violence and prejudice.
“You don’t look twice when you see a mixed relationship, as opposed to when I was in high school,” Dean told The Reporter. “But I will say as far as the overall picture and some of those issues – I think we have taken a step back. The sad part is that I think they are isolated incidents. But there are enough of those isolated incidents that it has become an overall issue in our country. There are a lot of good people. There are people who can look past it. But there are enough of those isolated incidents that this is something that needs to be discussed.”
John Carver, who plays the role of newspaper owner and father of the bride-to-be, Matt Drayton, has been involved with acting for 50 years, “on and off.” This Marine Corp veteran and former businessman has been in four feature films and more than a dozen short films. You can look him up on IMDB at this link.
He both agrees with Jamison about this being a favorite play and with Dean about the timely nature of this production.
“It’s one of my favorite movies, Carver said. “And like Onis said, I think it is time to bring this back up in front of people. I think it is time we revisit some of these things. We’ve made improvements, but it’s not where it needs to be. I think it will make people start thinking again about the racial aspects of their lives. That is one of the things I think is important about this particular show.”
Go to CarmelPlayers.org or call (317) 815-9387 for tickets before they sell out.