GREEN BOOK Galas

Frank Anthony Vallelonga, aka Tony Lip (Academy Award® nominee Viggo Mortensen), a New York City bouncer from an Italian-American neighborhood in The Bronx, is hired to drive and protect Dr. Don Shirley (Academy Award® winner Mahershala Ali), a world-class black pianist, on a concert tour from Manhattan to the Deep South. It’s 1962, during the volatile Civil Rights Movement and the men must rely on “The Green Book” — a travel guide to safe lodging, dining and business options for African Americans during the era of segregation and Jim Crow laws — to steer them to places where Shirley will not be refused service, humiliated or threatened with violence. Inspired by a true story, GREEN BOOK begins as a two-month journey of necessity ends up establishing a friendship that will endure for the rest of their lives.