Radio Golf

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Radio Golf is a play that first premiered in 2005 by August Wilson. The play was premiered by the Yale Repertory Theatre and then presented on the West Coast by the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, California. The Huntington Theatre Company in Boston, Massachusetts then produced it in October 2006.

The play is the final in Wilson's cycle of ten plays that examines the African-American experience in the 20th Century in the United States. Each play tackles a decade, and Radio Golf is the final play that covers the 1990s. The Goodman Theatre in Chicago, Illinois is the first theater to mount a production of all ten plays in the cycle. (Radio Golf completed The Goodman's cycle in early 2007.)

African American actor, writer, producer and director Harry Lennix, best known for his starring roles in Titus and The Matrix Revolutions, will be performing in Radio Golf on Broadway in 2007.

[edit] Plot

Harmond Wilks wants to redevelop the "blighted" area of the Hill District, building a high-rise apartment building with a ground floor filled with high-end chain stores like Starbucks, Whole Foods and Barnes & Noble. He and a partner, Roosevelt Hicks, along with Harmond's wife Mame, craft a plan to bring industry and economy back to the area, a bold step to revitalize the aging and decrepit neighborhood. Harmond's development plan runs hand in hand with his plans to become Pittsburgh's first black mayor. All three aim to grab a piece of the white American pie: a better life and capital gain. However, not everyone in the neighborhood sees redevelopment as the panacea it seems. As deeds, history, and family secrets are revealed to Harmond, his beliefs and his values begin to unravel.

[edit] Setting

The play is set in the office of the redevelopment company, but much of the drama surrounds the fate of a "raggedy-ass" house at 1839 Wylie Avenue in the Hill District. This house was also the setting of Wilson's Gem of the Ocean.