No less impressive is Audra McDonald as Lena's world-weary daughter-in-law, Ruth, burdened by the drudgery of daily life but also determined to carry on Consider Beneatha's romance with an African exchange student (played by a winning Teagle F Combs doesn't show us the man's bruises McDonald does something just as magical in a scene when Ruth's bitterness melts as she and Walter Lee rekindle the romance of their faltering marriage The actor has a compelling physical presence ââ‚¬â€? and he's fine in the comedy scenes, particularly when a drunken Walter Lee is improvising an African dance with his outspoken sister, Beneatha (Sanaa Lathan) REVIEW: Matriarchal Power in 'Raisin' Apr 26, 9:15 PM EST Mother scores best Hansberry died of cancer in 1965 at the age of 34 and is basically only known for this play His death has brought them the money that will allow them to own a home of their own, a house in an all-white neighborhood It's heartbreaking but the actress skillfully underplays it to get the full effect He should be the center of Hansberry's drama, the man who embodies the play's title ââ‚¬â€? taken from a line in a Langston Hughes' poem, "What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?" It's Walter who grapples head on with those dreams and it should be an exhausting struggle, one that was captured on stage and then on film by Sidney Poitier with a fierce brilliance " But Combs is not a nuanced performer who can bring to life the enormity of Walter Lee's resentment, much less his eventual redemption in the evening's final scene That brings us to the revival's obvious box-office draw: Sean Combs, the hip-hop impresario making his Broadway debut in the pivotal role of Walter Lee, Lena's son Bougere) and her determination to celebrate all things African while distaining the advances of a wealthy admirer (Frank Harts) All this is filtered through the young woman's desire to become a doctor, one of the many dreams "Raisin" celebrates Watch Rashad, in what could be a throwaway moment, as Lena sadly looks at a photograph of her dead husband And that goes for daughter-in-law, too She plays its sweetly, even shyly and with a genuine joy Fortunately, there are the other cast members to savor and plenty of other things going on in Hansberry's play, which seems overloaded with conflicts that Kenny Leon's straightforward direction doesn't minimize But with Combs in the cast, there will be a whole new audience for "A Raisin in the Sun The matriarchal contingent is the reason to see the Broadway revival of "A Raisin in the Sun," Lorraine Hansberry's landmark drama that opened Monday at the Royale Theatre As the widowed Lena Younger, Phylicia Rashad totally inhabits the very specific world created by Hansberry, a black family's South Side Chicago apartment in the late 1950s Rashad dominates the household and the play, giving a lovely, touching performance as the strong-willed woman who wants to lift her family out of the ghetto on the wings of a $10,000 insurance policy left by her late husband Walter Lee is an angry dreamer, frustrated with his job as a chauffeur for a wealthy white man