Compare And Contrast A Raisin In The Sun Book And Book

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Storytelling has been a part of people's’ lives since the beginning of time. It started with just verbal communication, then it was translated into written word, and now there hundreds of ways to tell those same stories. Movies and books, for example, are two very different ways to tell stories to an audience. A story can be a book, but not a movie or vice versa. Many books are made into movies, but lose major elements in translation. One of these examples is in A Raisin in the Sun. It was originally a play written by Lorraine Hansberry, in 1957, but became a movie in 1961 and then remade in 2008, which was directed by Kenny Leon. While the play and the movie follow the same storyline, there are many elements of the play that got added when …show more content…

In the movie there were many different settings compared to the one setting in the play. The film adaptation of A Raisin in the Sun takes the viewer to various settings such as the Younger family apartment, the Green Hat bar, Mama’s workplace, the street, the market, the hair salon, and the Younger’s new home. Each of these locations are mentioned in the play, but there were never any scenes set in those locations. In the play A Raisin in the Sun, everything happens in the living room or kitchen. “The YOUNGER living room would be a comfortable and well-ordered room if it were not for a number of indestructible contradictions to this state of being” (23 Hansberry). The closest that the play gets to leaving the living room and kitchen setting is walking out the door into the hall or yelling out the window. “(TRAVIS appears in the hall doorway, almost fully dressed and quite wide awake now, his towels and pajamas across his shoulders. He opens the door and signals for his father to make the bathroom in a hurry)” (27 Hansberry). The two different versions of the same story differ because of the settings that they each have. While the movie has many locations it strays from the original play that only had one location. The director of the movie might have added locations to make the visuals more interesting. When a movie is set in only one space it can become boring for the viewer. Therefore, …show more content…

The movie follows the same storyline as the play, but it puts major scenes in different locations than what was originally written in the play. One major part of the story is when Lena (Mama) gives Walter the remaining money from the insurance check. In the movie this happens in The Green Hat bar. In contrast, this moment happens in the apartment in the play version. “(She goes out, and WALTER sits looking at the money on the table. Finally, in a decisive gesture, he gets up, and, in mingled joy and desperation, picks up the money...)” (107 Hansberry). Additionally the movie strays from the play in setting when Willy tells Walter the news that the money is gone. In the movie Willy tells Walter the heartbreaking news outside of the apartment rather than in the apartment like the play (124-128 Hansberry). These major scenes from the story that take place in different settings give the moments different meanings. When in the apartment the scenes show the struggles the family faces together. When these situations happen outside of the apartment is makes them seem more like individual journeys or hardships. Leon, the director of the movie might have chose to put major scenes in different locations to make them seem more important. When an entire story takes place in one setting it can be hard to differentiate what is