Elain R. Graham

A documentary film about the life, times and experiences of eight theatre artists and a theatre critic in the theatre of New York City.

A Jewish parole officer, Jeff Solomon White, struggles in his new role as a reading teacher for illiterate teens at a New York high school. Hard Lesson film Raised by African American parents, White sees the situation differently and is motivated to fight for his students, who face an almost certain life of crime and prison

A black man in a white mans game, defied all the odds against him to become one of the top players in the world.

Dr. Sarah Chapel returns to the small town of Brighton Mills when her father Dr. Robert Chapel unexpectedly dies. His clients and friends miss him, and Sarah discloses that all of them have perfect health; they hear voices when they are sleeping; and they are addicted to the stimulant Tributol. Her further investigation discloses a dark secret about the haunting voices.

Trying to bootstrap his way out of Brooklyn's mean streets is Diamond, a rap musician. With his long-time pal Gage acting as his manager, he's trying to lay down a demo tape with cut-rate studio time. To pay the bills, he and Gage run drugs for "Mr. B." Inside a week, Diamond's beloved mother dies suddenly, his father appears after an absence of 12 years and wants a relationship, and his girlfriend Kia tells him she's pregnant, asking him if he's ready to be a father. Gage steals $100,000 in a multiple-felony robbery so that Diamond can record a full album, not knowing it's Mr. B's money he's taken. B wants his money, Diamond wants his music, Tia wants an answer.

A loathsome man ends up dead, but it's not clear who's to blame. If ever a person got what he deserved, it's James Urbanksi, an abusive drunk who steals from his wife, Joyce, and promises her close friend Cynthia Kellogg that she'll be the next target of his rage. At a group outing, James bleeds to death after someone cuts his throat. But because he's such a terrible human being, police aren't sure which of his acquaintances decided to kill him.

Brantley Foster, a well-educated kid from Kansas, has always dreamed of making it big in New York, but once in New York, he learns that jobs - and girls - are hard to get. When Brantley visits his uncle, Howard Prescott, who runs a multi-million-dollar company, he is given a job in the company's mail room.