The Theater: New Play in Manhattan, Apr. 9, 1956

Mister Johnson (adapted from Joyce Gary's novel by Norman Rosten) is a young West African Negro who has become a British government clerk and yearns to be a full-fledged, "civilized," Christian Briton. But, even in his bumbling and his guile, the sunny-natured, light-fingered, childlike clerk is miles from his models. An orphan of two cultures, he carries a furled umbrella while walking barefoot, with his patent leather pumps hanging about his neck.

To be sure, in the thorny matter of getting a road built, it is Mister Johnson who finds the answer—but in so...

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