`LESSON' OFFERS A RARE TREAT FOR ROANOKE THEATERGOERS

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, February 27, 1992                   TAG: 9202260192
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: JEFF DeBELL STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Long
`LESSON' OFFERS A RARE TREAT FOR ROANOKE THEATERGOERS
The work of black playwright August Wilson, who stands in the front rank of living American dramatists, will reach the stage of Mill Mountain Theatre this week for the first time.
Wilson's "The Piano Lesson" previews tonight at 7:30 and opens officially Friday. It will continue through March 15, with Jere Lee Hodgin directing.
The play is the fifth in a projected 10-play cycle about the experience of being black in the U.S.
Both "The Piano Lesson" and the earlier "Fences" won the Pulitzer Prize for drama, thereby admitting Wilson to membership in the select group of playwrights who have claimed the prize more than once. His fellow members include Eugene O'Neill, Thornton Wilder and Tennessee Williams.
"He is one of America's greatest playwrights now," Hodgin said, "and to ignore that in producing American works would be an injustice."
It isn't always easy for regional theaters to produce Wilson, who maintains tight control over his plays. Mill Mountain has sought the rights to his work before without success.
Hodgin believes permission to do "The Piano Lesson" was granted in part because of the educational outreach program that Mill Mountain is conducting in connection with production of the play. It includes in-school visits by actors and theater staff members, plus special performances for high-school audiences.
Wilson's plays lend themselves well to such enterprises. They provide insights into one of the country's important racial minorities. They are known for their literary merit - critics regularly mention the playwright's poetic, almost musical language - and for their strong sense of history. Each play is set in a different decade of the 20th century.
"The Piano Lesson" takes place in 1936. Its setting is the Pittsburgh home of a railroad cook named Doaker Charles, who shares the place with his niece, her daughter and an ornate upright piano that dates from before the Civil War.
In a way, the piano is the play's central character. Doaker's father and grandmother were traded for it as slaves. Left behind, the grieving grandfather carved portraits of his wife and son into the instrument's wooden legs. The piano eventually was retrieved by the family and passed down to its current owners: Doaker's niece, Berniece, and her brother, an ebullient Mississippi farmer named Boy Willie.
The piano is both a metaphor for the past, which is an important presence in all of Wilson's plays, and the subject of conflict between Boy Willie and Berniece. He wants to sell it to help raise money to buy his own farm - on the very land where his ancestors once were enslaved. Berniece stubbornly resists, wanting to hang onto the heirloom.
To her it is a priceless reminder of slavery and the family's suffering, whereas Boy Willie views the piano as the key to economic freedom and a brighter future. The issues that inform their dispute provide the "piano lesson" of the play's title.
"We know where the piano ends up," Hodgin said. What we don't know - at least, not if we expect the 46-year-old playwright to hand us the answer - is who is "right" in the moral struggle between Boy Willie and Berniece.
"It's still ambiguous," Hodgin said. "I think that's part of the strength of the play."
Mill Mountain's all-black cast is headed by Lynne-Marie Brown and Herbert Mark Parker, respectively, as Berniece and Boy Willie. Brown is making her first appearance on the stage at Center in the Square. She lives in New York and has more than 30 off-off Broadway credits.
Parker will be remembered by Mill Mountain regulars for his performance as Bottom in last season's production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream." He has a master's degree in acting from Ohio University and is a veteran of the regional theater circuit.
Doaker Charles is portrayed by Carl Jackson, also appearing at Mill Mountain for the first time. He is a graduate of Virginia Commonwealth University, where he received the outstanding drama student award, and has credits in stage acting, dancing, film, video and production.
Thomas Byrd III plays Doaker's saloon-pianist brother, Wining Boy. Lymon, Boy Willie's Mississippi friend, is played by Tim Johnson. Leonard E. Steinline Jr. is Avery, a suitor to Berniece. The part of Berniece's daughter, Maretha, is shared by Roanoke seventh-graders Maria Briggs and Damecha Delany. Robin McClamb has the part of Grace, a young woman in Pittsburgh.
John Sailer designed the scenery and lighting. Costumes are by Anne M. Toewe, and Rachel Hohn is stage manager.
"The Piano Lesson" continues through March 15 at Mill Mountain Theatre. Evening performances are at 7:30 on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Sundays, 8 Fridays and Saturdays. Weekend matinees are at 2 p.m. General admission is $11-$17. Discounts are available to students, senior citizens and groups of 15 or more. The box office telephone is 342-5740. "The Piano Lesson" will be signed for the hearing-impaired at the March 14 matinee, and hearing-impaired patrons will receive a discount on tickets for that performance.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB