What makes Waiting for Lefty such an extraordinary play is the way the play takes a political stand against unfair working condition in the 1930s. The plays “agit-prop” theatre style allows the play to be performed anywhere and reach a large audience. To make the play more current, the political issue could be about immigration.
Since the play has several different scenes about how unfair wages and working condition affected different groups of people at the time, I think the same can be done with the issue of immigration. One act could be about immigrants trying to receive access into the United States. Another scene could be about a child of an illegal immigrant currently living in the United States. There could also be a scene about an illegal immigrant trying to find work and supporting their family. Another one could be about a legal immigrant trying to find work and the prejudice against him.
I feel that this political issue could influence a lot of people’s opinions and make an impact like Waiting for Lefty. To make the play more modern and to reach a bigger audience, it will have to hit the viral market. The play could be posted online and pay a fee to view the play. Then the proceeds could go to helping the cause. By putting it online you are making the play more not only hit the United States, but other countries that can relate and might have similar issues.
I feel that an adaptation of this play to any current day issue, not just immigration is rather difficult. This is because there are extremely few issues in which such a large demographic of people are so heavily affected and still have a unified opinion on. The great depression affected vast amounts of people, and the over whelming majority of them were on the bad end of it. Where as today, almost any issue has a rather conflicted split between the two sides to where it would be difficult to get such strong audience feeling and participation that this play depended on.
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