Like most Black theatre majors, I have a complicated history with August Wilson. Both in high school and in my undergraduate studies, I would find myself pigeonholed into portraying characters that did not speak to me whatsoever because I “had to have a Wilson in my pocket.” I didn’t appreciate this notion that August Wilson’s cycle was the paramount representation of the Black experience especially because I rarely saw myself in these stories. I might still be bitter that I was forced to do a scene from Piano Lesson for my final of Junior Year instead of something from McCraney’s Brother/Sister Plays like I WANTED. Anyway.
Denzel Washington and Viola Davis in Fences
Now that I’m in graduate school, I’m training my mind to work and analyze plays and their efficacy more deeply. In my “Introduction to Dramaturgy” course, we did a case study on August Wilson featuring a number of essays and Fences and Gem of the Ocean. I had done Cory’s monologue and read Fences for my college auditions and saw the movie when it came out, so I thought that I had a pretty good grasp on it. I was INCORRECT. For those of you who don’t know, I just recently realized that I was Black. It was a whole thing. With the perspective that that discovery gave me, reading the Wilson classic was an entirely new experience. I started to see so much more of myself in Cory and even Lyons. I started to hear echoes of my own family in the Maxsons. Perhaps more importantly, I started to see examples of my own understanding of the greater Black experience at large. It also broke my heart to hear the same conversations about breaking oppressive cycles and the inability to get above your station in a society built to keep you down that I’ve been having with my own friends. When we brought our experiences to class to discuss, I heard from some of my other classmates of color (don’t get too excited…there aren’t that many…it’s still an Ivy League) talk about their own experiences with reading the play. They discussed visceral and cathartic experiences with the text: strong personal connections to the characters, fear for their wellbeing. Most importantly, they felt extremely more connected to the piece than any other we had read so far. That’s the most important thing.
Spike Lee, director, and leads Viola Davis and Chadwick Boseman
In previous classes, we discussed the point of theatre and what it means to be in a theatrical space. Mostly, we focused on why people don’t go to the theatre. We tossed around the typical ideas: too expensive, too far away, seen as fluffy or unimportant. The most striking recurring reason, however, centered around the idea that the theatre is only for a certain kind of person. In the current time, many theaters are wracking their brains to find some way to diversify their audiences to hopefully stop resembling the monolithic institutions that they intrinsically are. How can we hope to diversify our audiences when the longstanding reputation of “The Theatre” is that it is, always has been, and always will be exclusively for a certain kind of person: old, white people. It’s going to take a lot more than doing Once on This Island or Raisin’ in the Sun every couple of years to create lasting change. I think that we can use this trend of adapting the Pittsburgh Cycle to the screen can play a big part in changing the culture.
August Wilson
It’s impossible to ignore that the cinema has a much more broadly reaching appeal across the country. Though August Wilson may feel obvious and overdone in our theatre bubble, you’d be surprised for how many people his legacy remains a mystery. He dedicated the majority of his life to chronicling what he thought of the Black experience. By tracking our lives through the century, he unearths the tissues connecting our current trauma to the trauma of our ancestors resulting in a cathartic, connected experience. He was writing about us for us. With the widespread knowledge of his canon, we can possibly start to shift the understanding of the nature of the theatre and actually start to attract diverse audiences by stimulating diverse interest. Then, we’ll have to worry about all of those things like distance and those pesky ticket prices. And think about how fun all of the magic in shows like Gem of the Ocean will transfer to the screen! I also might be biased because I’m interested to see into how many roles in the Pittsburgh Cycle we can shove Viola Davis.
I think with the proper direction and marketing (making it clear that these movies are based on plays) a film series of August Wilson’s century plays will reinforce the idea that theatre, as a concept, is a diverse representation of the realities of life; therefore, anyone and everyone should feel comfortable and able to go and see some version of themselves.
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