Julie Benz

One-man Broadway play about a boarding house in the ’50s and ’60s becomes a star-studded movie on HBO

In its original off-Broadway run, the play Lackawanna Blues was a one-man show, with all the roles performed by the writer, Ruben Santiago-Hudson. He based the characters on his extended family.

But HBO’s film version (debuting at 8 p.m. today) is filled to bursting with stars - among them such familiar faces as Macy Gray, Mos Def, Louis Gossett Jr., Ernie Hudson, Delroy Lindo, Rosie Perez, Liev Schreiber, Henry Simmons, Jimmy Smits, Patricia Wettig, Julie Benz and Jeffrey Wright.

And Santiago-Hudson is still part of the action, both on-screen as a minor character and behind the scenes as one of the executive producers.

When he was first trying to drum up interest in a film version of the play, Santiago-Hudson had a powerful ally - Halle Berry, a friend and longtime fan of his work.

"People didn’t know Ruben Santiago-Hudson in the wide realm of TV," he said, "so I needed a voice and I needed a champion. And that’s when Halle came in and said, ’Well, let me get the people to see it. If they see it, it will be done.’"

Because of her previous working relationship with HBO from her acclaimed made-for-TV movie Introducing Dorothy Dandridge, Berry knew that the cable channel would be a good home for the project.

"Ever since my Dorothy Dandridge project, I’ve felt like family (with HBO)," she said. "They are interested in bringing quality to the screen."

The focus of Lackawanna Blues is the relationship between Nanny (S. Epatha Merkerson of Law & Order), who runs a bustling boarding house in 1950s and ’60s New York, and Junior (Marcus Carl Franklin), a young boy Nanny raises as her own when his mother abandons him. But other characters, including boarders and family members, figure heavily into the story as well.

Terrence Howard plays Nanny’s turbulent husband, Bill. Robert Bradley plays Otis, a blind blues singer. Among the other supporting characters are Dick Barrymore (Hudson), Nanny’s old flame; Bertha (Perez), her friend and confidante; Freddie (Santiago-Hudson), a troubled World War II veteran; Ol’ Po’ Carl (Lou Myers), an alcoholic ex-Negro Leagues star; and Pauline (Gray), a scatterbrained young woman. Smits plays Junior’s ne’er-do-well father, and Carmen Ejogo plays his mother. Mos Def has a small but memorable role as the bandleader at a local club who performs the songs "Caledonia" and "Destination Love."

The character of Junior is based on Santiago-Hudson. Growing up, he didn’t realize what a unique living arrangement he had.

"As a child, you get taunted a lot," he said. "You live in a room in a house with a bunch of crazy people, and you get taunted. So I didn’t realize how special it was until I started exploring and hearing about people who had a mother, a father, a dog and a yard."

In retrospect, Santiago-Hudson said he was glad to have grown up the way he did.

"Nanny always told me as a child, ’You’re special,’" he said. "Everybody in the house, the little bit of themselves they thought was the best, they gave to me."

George C. Wolfe, an acclaimed stage director who helped Santiago-Hudson develop his life story into a stage play, directed the film.

Wolfe is an acclaimed creative force in the New York theater scene, as a director and a writer, but Lackawanna Blues marks his first experience in filmmaking.

Wolfe said he enjoyed the challenge of working in a different medium. "Every single thing that you do in a play happens in a film. It just happens in a weird order, so I was constantly transposing it."

"The great thing about working with George, as an actor, when you work with him onstage is that he’s always looking for the truth in the emotional thrust of the scene," Santiago-Hudson said. "He brought the same values to the movie."