Harlem born Cecily Tyson should soon be adding an Emmy to the Tony she has already won for playing Carrie Watts in this new adaptation of “The Trip to Bountiful.”
The story of an elderly woman’s final visit to her first earthly home, “Bountiful” is a seemingly simple story that spreads itself as wide as the Texas sky.
Joyful and heartbreaking, it captures the strength everyone needs to live this fragile life.
“Bountiful” was first presented in 1953 as an NBC teleplay and Broadway drama, then resurrected as a film in 1985. It won an Oscar for its star, Geraldine Page.
It was revived last year on Broadway; this film has most of the stage cast. While some might call this the “black” version, skin color matters not at all to the essence of the story.
Besides Tyson, Blair Underwood plays Carrie’s distracted son and Vanessa Williams has the unsympathetic role of her exasperated daughter-in-law.
All the actors nail their parts, but Tyson runs the show.
She’s elderly and frail, and she has led a hard life of trouble. She’s now waiting out her days in her son’s house in Houston, mostly sitting in a rocking chair staring out the window.
When her son and daughter-in-law refuse to drive her to Bountiful, her hometown, she marshals her few resources and her still-sharp wits to get there anyway.
If it all sounds sentimental, it’s not, nor is it feel-good in any way you’d expect. We don’t know what Carrie wants and neither, really, does she. She only knows that she has to get there and see.
“The Trip to Bountiful” feels like a trip that matters (Source).
Check out the video here:
Editor’s Note: some Harlem World Magazine staff saw “The Trip to Bountiful” and loved every second it.
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