Intense dramatic episodes show that Troy and Cory clash over the boy’s plans to become a football player. Troy asks Bono: “How in the hell they done changed ? Bono replies: They got lots of colored boys playing ball now. The main problem is that a top-notch baseball player during the Negro League’s heyday, Troy is too old to play on a desegregated Major League team. At the same time, Troy tries the best way he knows how to direct the course of his own son’s life away from the negative influence of the boy’s ancestors. Troy Maxson is a fifty-three-year old garbage collector who still can recall ugly images of life under the iron rule of a frustrated, defeated father. The play is based on a conflict between a father and his sons caused by misunderstanding and egoism of Troy. Beaufort St., Normal.The main character of Fences, Troy, reflects the cultural environment of the period and his time. Performance parking is available for free in the School Street Parking Deck, 400 W. Tickets are $12 for adults and $10 for students and seniors. Monday through Friday, at (309) 438-2535, or purchase tickets online at. Westhoff Theatre is at the corner of School and Beaufort streets in Normal.įor tickets or information, contact the College of Fine Arts Box Office, located in the Center for the Performing Arts, open from 11 a.m. There will also be a matinee performance on October 4 at 2 p.m. In addition to winning the Pulitzer Prize for playwright Wilson, the 1987 Broadway performance nearly swept the Tonys that year, winning for Best Play, Direction of a Play (Lloyd Richards), Leading Actor in a Play (James Earl Jones), and Featured Actress in a Play (Mary Alice).įences will be presented October 2, 3, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 with performances at 7:30 p.m.

While fighting for equality in the workplace and struggling to support his family, Maxson’s bitterness threatens to tear apart his family.įences was the third play written by Wilson in his “Pittsburgh Cycle,” a series of plays written to depict African-American life in each decade of the 20th century.

Maxson is consumed with the injustice that barred him from a career in baseball, being too old when the Major League was finally integrated in 1946. Set in 1957 on the cusp of the Civil Rights Movement, Fences tells the story of Troy Maxson, a former athlete of the Negro National League. Performances will be in Westhoff Theatre through October 10. The Illinois State University School of Theatre and Dance will present August Wilson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Fences, opening October 2, 2015.

Fences wilson