First Presbyterian Theater presents
"Driving Miss Daisy" By Alfred Uhry
Featuring Nancy Cook, Tony McCarrol, and Kirby Volz
Directed by Thom Hofrichter
Nov. 4-6, 12-14, 19-20, 1999
This 1988 Pulitzer Prize Winner and winner of a Best Picture Academy Award takes us to Atlanta mid-century and tells the story of an elderly Jewish matron and her chauffeur. This play, which spans 25 years, is a delicate depiction of racial tensions and growing old. Uhry has created two outsiders who come to a mutual respect based on their independence, strength, and stubborn integrity.
The play stars Nancy Cook as Daisy, Tony McCarrol as Hoke, and Kirby Volz as Daisy's son Boolie.
Sometimes, it's the music that makes you go to the theater, like "Some Enchanted Evening" spent in the company of Rodgers and Hammerstein. Sometimes it's the sheer spectacle ("Les Miserables"), the laughs ("The Odd Couple"), the costumes and makeup ("Cats") or even the sets ("Grand Hotel").
Primarily, though, it's the people onstage, fellow human beings whose relationships may be so fulfilling, so empty, so joyous or so depressed that we're willing to sit with strangers for two hours in a dark room in hopes of learning something enlightening about ourselves.
Two local theaters are putting people at center stage in their new productions -- "Driving Miss Daisy," opening with a preview tonight at First Presbyterian Theater, and "Spike Heels," opening Friday in Studio Theatre at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne.
With the help of actors and directors, let's peer under the characters' psyches and probe the problems.
'Driving Miss Daisy'
Daisy Werthan, a rich, crotchety old Jewish woman in Atlanta, circa 1950, is losing her independence to Father Time. She can't drive anymore, at the insistence of her son, Boolie, and resents having to rely on an elderly black man, Hoke Cole-burn, to chauffeur her around town. Over the next 25 years, animosity, racial tensions and class differences between them gradually give way to deep affection.
"I knew many Miss Daisies when I was growing up in Tennessee. One was my Aunt Mamie," says Nancy Cook, who plays the title role. "She was a proper Southern lady. I think a lot of people who grew up in the South knew someone like Miss Daisy."
Tony McCarrol, who plays Hoke, knew someone like Miss Daisy while growing up in Fort Wayne -- Helene Foellinger, late publisher of this newspaper. "My aunt cooked for her when I was a kid. I used to go to her house and I remember being very impressed. Wow! A mansion! She was always very nice to us."
The growth of Daisy and Hoke's relationship is what this play is about, Cook feels. "Despite their differences, Daisy and Hoke have a lot in common. Both grew up poor and suffered discrimination. At one point she tells Hoke about her memories of her (Jewish) temple being bombed. You'd think she'd empathize with him, but I think that because of her upbringing at that time, Daisy always remains an unconscious racist. She and Hoke grow old together, but they're never on equal footing."
McCarrol feels the same way. "I don't think Miss Daisy ever really shares Hoke's belief that underneath it all, everyone is an equal and should be treated with respect and dignity. Even in her old age, she's still stuck in her racism even though she doesn't realize it. The most important common bond between Daisy and Hoke is aging together and knowing each other's ways."
Director Thom Hofrichter adds that "Driving Miss Daisy" is not a sentimental treatment of race relations in the South "where at the end you go, 'Oh look, how nice that the white folks and the black folks get along at the end.' "
Instead, Hofrichter sees the relationship between Daisy and Hoke like master and dog: "I love my dog. He's my best friend. But he really has no rights. I tell him when to eat and when to go to the bathroom. If he misbehaves too much, I'll get another dog."
The hardest part of Hoke's role is pretending to be driving Miss Daisy, McCarrol says. "She sits on a chair behind me and I mimic the actions of a chauffeur. . . . Sometimes my foot's on the brake when it should be on the gas."
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