Robin Givens' Stage Play "Joy in the Morning"

All lights were on Robin Givens at the opening night in Toronto of her play Joy in the Morning at The Queen Elizabeth Theatre Saturday night as she stepped off the stage and into a new role that she has never played before.
The renowned actress wrote and directed the full-length play by taking her mother’s book and worked with her to transform it into a live performance presented by Exclusive Entertainment Events and G98.7 FM. The cast, who had only four days to rehearse, featured several Torontonians including Canadian singer Divine Brown, and touched the crowd with its undeniable talent of acting and singing, while telling the powerful, yet comedic, story of love and forgiveness.
“Your story is your story. We are more the same than different. There really is only one story,” Givens said before the show began.

 With limited props and only 96 hours of preparation, the talented cast performed the compelling story of Grace Edwards, who lost her husband in a horrible circumstance and must in turn forgive him and begin again to find herself. The cast sang out beautiful hymns, which echoed throughout the theatre.
There were many technical difficulties throughout the show, but the crowd was amused by the performance nonetheless. The characters and music got people out of their seats and they laughed, shouted and sang along with the actors throughout the story.

DJ “The Mailman” George Fynn presented Givens to the crowd and congratulated the cast after the show. “The show didn’t go unhinged. It wasn’t without hard work and trial to get this right. Every one of these people put their hearts in it to bring it to you,” he said.
Even with a few hiccups along the way, the hard work of Givens and the immense skills of the cast and crew are to be commended, as it is hard to believe the short amount of time they had to put together the compelling production.
“You can uplift people with the arts. I got my first big job in Toronto in an HBO movie when I was 16 years old and in many respects, Toronto has been very much home for me and I felt very comfortable here. So I want to offer my thanks in hanging in there with us,” Givens said to the audience during the play’s intermission with a hyper energy, strutting around the stage with her mic in hand, and apologizing for the imminent tech issues. “It’s a wonderful story, with [Toronto] talent.”