Posted by | Ray Cornelius
Indie Wire is reporting that the grandniece of the late playwright, Lorraine Hansberry is gearing up for a biopic about her famous aunt.
Taye Hansberry (left) is reportedly teaming up with Scandal casting director, Will Stewart and writer Numa Perrier for an unconventional film based on the life of the Harlem author and activist.
Taye is playing Lorraine along with Awkward Black Girl’s Issa Rae as Hansberry’s friend and legendary jazz diva Nina Simone. TV and film actor, Jaleel White rounds out the cast as author and Hansberry’s closest confidant, James Baldwin.
Hansberry was best known for her play A Raisin in the Sun, a line taken from Langston Hughes’ poem, A Dream Deferred. She was also a voice of the Civil Right Movement and penned the play To Be Young, Gifted and Black, before her death. The show was later used as the title of a song that would become the movement’s anthem and was performed famously by Simone.
Hansberry left behind an unfinished novel and several other plays, including What Use Are Flowers? and The Drinking Gourd. She died of pancreatic cancer at age 34. Production for the biopic is slated to begin in early fall with the project now heading toward pre-production.
RC will keep you posted as this story develops.
