If you enjoyed the book or have seen the new movie 'The Help', you'll love this play! It deals with a lot of moral issues and dynamics of the era leading up to the Civil Rights movement. It's a real look back in history!
'Master Harold'.. & The Boys: Background
Now a major motion picture starring Freddie Highmore as Hally
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"The play takes place in South Africa during apartheid (racial segregation) era, and depicts how institutionalized racism, bigotry, or hatred can become absorbed by those who live under it."
On a rainy afternoon, Sam and Willie, two middle-aged African servants whom seventeen year-old Harold (Hally) has known all his life, are practicing ballroom steps in the dining area of his mothers café in preparation for a major competition.
Hally then arrives at the café from school and starts on his homework. The conversation moves from Hally's schoolwork, to an intellectual discussion on "A Man of Magnitude", to flashbacks of Hally, Sam, and Willie when they lived in a Boarding House. Hally warmly remembers the simple act of flying a kite Sam had made for him; we later learn the real reason Sam made the kite for Hally.
Tension arises when Hally learns that his tyrannical alcoholic father, who had been in the hospital due to medical complications with the leg he lost in World War II, is returning home. Hally is distraught since his father being home will make home life unbearable. He unleashes years of anger, pain, and vicarious racism from his father, creating possibly permanent rifts in his relationship with Sam and Willie.
Check it out! You won't regret it!