All good things must come to an end, and in the case of the Pacific Conservatory Theatre (PCPA), its 53rd season is closing with a production of one of the most compelling and dynamic plays ever conceived for the theater—August Wilson’s Fences.
Part of Wilson’s legendary 10-play Pittsburgh Cycle, Fences racked up awards when it first debuted on Broadway (with James Earl Jones in the lead role). In 1987, it won Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play, the Tony Award for Best Play, and a Pulitzer Prize for Best Play. The 2010 Broadway revival starring Denzel Washington (who would later star in and direct an Oscar-nominated film version) also won a Drama Desk and Tony Award for best revival. In short, Fences is a juggernaut of dramatic acclaim.
Fences tells the story of several years in the life of the Maxsons, a black family living in 1957 Pittsburgh. Troy (Derrick Lee Weeden), the patriarch of the family, is a former Negro Baseball League star who now works as a garbageman, still clinging to his resentments and anguish. His wife, Rose (Karole Foreman), is the mother of his son, Cory (Chris Mansa), an aspiring high school football player. The play also features other characters central to Troy’s life including his other son, Lyons (Satchel Andre); brother, Gabriel (Michael G. Keck); and best friend, Jim (Michael J. Asberry).
Fences is an ambitious and meaty play; it tackles a broad number of issues in a compact package. Troy is forever building a fence (either for his wife or because he is desperate to keep something out) at the family’s home. Troy and Jim drink their work woes away while Jim peels away at dark secrets his lifelong friend has been hiding. Cory, the couple’s son, determinedly eyes a future playing college football, despite his father’s best efforts to keep him away. The more of the fence Troy builds, the further away he pushes himself from his family and toward the thing he dreads most.
Mangled on the inside by years of systemic racial and familial abuse, Troy constantly spars with the love and support offered to him. Weeden carries the performance entirely as a bold juxtaposition of motivations: Troy seeks love yet willfully and spitefully brutalizes those who offer it to him. The boards of his fence form the fragile layers of his own world view; alone they are weak and penetrable, but nailed firmly together they create the barrier of his isolation.
The Maxsons are not living the white picket fence American dream; they are surviving in the fallout of it. Dreams are a cancer to Troy, who was left bitter after a career in the segregated baseball league that failed to lead him to the success he now sees other black men enjoying. Troy feasts on his resentment; just as Cory dares to entertain the notion of a football career, Troy is there to aggressively stamp it out. Troy only trusts the money he can count, the solid reliability that the dollars he earns not only secure his place in the world but make him the master of it.
Without strong performances, it would be hard to suss out the layers of these complex characters. Weeden is a mountain of an actor; he packs oceans of talent into a caustic yet vulnerable Troy. It takes a great finesse for an actor to mitigate Troy’s fragile cruelty with his own deeply troubled soul, and Weeden doesn’t take this for granted.
The play also contains what is probably one of the greatest monologues ever written for a woman, which starts with Rose’s triumphant, “I been standing with you! I been right here with you, Troy,” line. Foreman tears into this speech and brings Rose to life with piercing intoxication. Rose’s fence is one of desperation, a yearning to secure the things she holds most dear as close as possible even as they try so hard to hurt or push her away. Foreman’s sturdy vulnerability belies the brutality of Rose’s struggle, hurling her humanity toward the audience at breakneck speed.
It’s fitting that the close of PCPA’s 53rd season featured a rousing standing ovation for Weeden, whose work has helped define an ambitious and impressive collection of productions. Fences, a heartbreaking and monumental production, is a welcome addition to their roster and a hopeful sign that even more greatness is yet to come.
Arts and Lifestyle Writer Rebecca Rose would like to remind you to turn off your dumb phone during plays. Contact her at rrose@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Sep 21-28, 2017.