Opening Night: Cicely Tyson & James Earl Jones In The Gin Game

The reunion 50 years in the making is finally here as Black Theater legends James Earl Jones and Cicely Tyson celebrate opening night for the Pulitzer Prize-winning play The Gin Game.  You can check back here for all our updates tonight!

UPDATE: Opening Night arrival photos & interviews with Cicely Tyson & James Earl Jones below!

Weller Martin (Jones) and Fonsia Dorsey (Tyson) meet on the porch of their nursing home and strike up a friendship, with Weller teaching Fonsia how to play gin rummy. As they play, they share stories about the lives they led in the outside world. But when Fonsia wins every hand, Weller becomes increasingly frustrated, until their gin games and conversations become a battleground, with each player exposing the other’s failures, disappointments and insecurities.

This highly anticipated collaboration marks the first time the pair has worked together on Broadway since starring in A Hand Is On The Gate in 1966. They also starred in the long-running Off-Broadway production of Jean Genet’s The Blacks, opposite each other in the film “The River Niger,” and in the TV movie “Heat Wave.”

Photos by Joan Marcus

Jones is a two-time Tony Award-winner for his role in Fences and Great White Hope, three-time Emmy Award winner, Grammy Award-winner and a recipient of an Honorary Academy Award.  Tyson is a three-time Emmy Award-winner, Academy Award-nominee and won her first Tony Award in 2014 for her role in The Trip to Bountiful.

Winner of the 1978 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, The Gin Game returns to the Golden Theatre where the original production opened in 1977, starring Hume Cronyn and Jessica Tandy. This is the third time the play has been performed on Broadway. The two previous Broadway productions were nominated for a number of Tony Awards, including Best Play, Best Revival of a Play, and Best Actress in a Play.  The Gin Game has also been filmed twice for television: in 1981 with original stars Cronyn and Tandy, and in 2003 with Dick van Dyke and Mary Tyler Moore.

UPDATE: There was definitely no shortage of star power last night at the opening of The Gin Game on Broadway. Check out the photos below of Alfre Woodard, Lynn Whitfiled, Crystal Dickenson, Jason Dirden, John David Washington & more! Also, watch the stars of The Gin Game, Cicely Tyson & James Earl Jones, talk with Broadway Black about their production, developing their characters, & a few life lessons.

Photos By Darnell Lamont Walker

Directed by Leonard Foglia, the revival will run through January 10, 2016.  For more information and to purchase tickets, click HERE.