CLEVELANDURBANNEWS.COM-CLEVELAND, Ohio-Former first lady Michelle Obama, the nation's first Black first lady, spoke to a sold-out but jubilant crowd at Playhouse Square in downtown Cleveland on Saturday, March 16, a visit that came as part of her international book tour for her new memoir titled “Becoming: An Intimate Conversation with Michelle Obama,” a New York Times Best Seller.
Tickets prices began at $89.50, and the show took little time selling out.
The highly anticipated book tour, a tour of select cities in the U.S., Canada, and Europe, has also hit major cities like Chicago and Milwaukee and heads next week to Portland, Oregon, and then to Vancouver, Canada, a solid tour schedule with more than 21 stops in April alone, including Paris, France and the Netherlands.
Moderated by ABC's "The Chew" host Carla Hall, who is Black, Michelle Obama stepped onto the stage Saturday evening at Cleveland's Playhouse Square, which she described as a 'beautiful theatre,' and said "Hey Cleveland," the crowd going wild.
The Cleveland audience was largely White, and majority female, but women and men across racial lines were there, and Michelle Obama did not hesitate in talking about what it means to be a Black woman, and the wife of a United States president, among a host of other issues.
Released in November and grabbing first place for the best selling book of 2018, her 400 pages plus memoir that critics say appeals to women across the board, and empowers them, drew women in droves to Cleveland's event.
"We feel so blessed to be here," said Sherell Harris Perkins Taylor, a 30-something Black woman. "She [Michelle Obama] is so amazing."
Hall was a keen moderator, and she and Michelle Obama had obvious stage chemistry, two strong and successful Black women at the helm of a progressive audience anxious for entertainment.
Hall asked Michelle Obama "what's going on?" and the former first lady responded, "Girl, I'm sitting down talking with you."
Hall said the former first lady looked amazing and asked "what are you wearing?" Michelle Obama responding that her dress was designed by a talented African -American female designer.
Hall complimented Michelle Obama, saying she used her voice and her fashion as first lady to "put new designer's on the map."
A scholar and a trendsetter, Michelle Obama said that in general Americans cared more about what she wore as first lady and how she wore it than her Ivy League background, revealing that while much has changed for women in America over time, much has not.
She called famed designer Oscar de le Renta, who is purportedly seriously ill, "a close friend."
She and Hall touched on major aspects of the book, including Michelle Obama's beginnings, her years in the White House with her husband, former president Barack Obama, a Democrat and the nation's first Black president, and politics, work, and motherhood.
Raised by her blue collar parents on the South Side of Chicago, along with her older brother, Craig Robinson, a successful college basketball coach, Michelle Obama said the American dream is in reach to other Americans as well, and that dreams do come true.
"There are millions of Craig and Michelle Robinson's," she said.
A Princeton University undergraduate and Harvard Law School graduate who met the former president, who is four years older, in their younger years before he became famous, and as his boss when he was an attorney at the Chicago law firm of Sidley Austin, she said women can achieve their goals, though they must expect obstacles. .
She was gracious, and at the end of the program she thanked those in attendance for support of her book tour.
An active and likable first lady whose approval ratings reveal the love and respect she has garnered from the American public since stepping into the White House with President Obama in 2009 for his first term as president, Michelle Obama stood by her husband's side, and helped him become president.
She campaigned for then U.S. senator Barack Obama, a former Illinois state senator and community organizer on Chicago's South Side, throughout 2007 and 2008, delivering a keynote address at the 2008 Democratic National Convention.
And she rallied for President Obama relative to his successful reelection bid in 2012, and spoke at the Democratic National Convention that year.
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Pictured is former United States first lady Michelle Obama, the nation's first Black first lady
