2024/2025
GUIDELINES FOR ATTENDING THE THEATER
Attending live theater is a unique experience with many valuable educational and social benefits. To ensure that all audience members are able to enjoy the performance, please take a few minutes to discuss the following audience etiquette topics with your students before you come to Hartford Stage.
• How is attending the theater similar to and different from going to the movies? What behaviors are and are not appropriate when seeing a play? Why?
• Remind students that because the performance is live, the audience affects the performance. No two audiences are exactly the same and no two performances are exactly the same—this is part of what makes theater so special!
• Theater should be an enjoyable experience for the audience. Audience members are welcome to applaud when appropriate and laugh at the funny moments. Talking is distracting to other audience members and the actors on stage. Theaters are constructed to carry sound efficiently!
• Any noise or light can be a distraction, so please remind students to make sure their cell phones are turned off. Students should not text, or take photos or video during the performance.
• Students should sit with their group as seated by the Front of House staff and should not leave their seats once the performance has begun. Students will have the chance to get a drink or snack, eat lunch, or use the restroom at intermission.
Jerome Preston Bates, Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr., and Taji Senior in Two Trains Running
David Jennings and Rafael Jordan in Two Trains Running
ABOUT THE PLAY
It is 1969. Big construction projects have started in Pittsburgh’s Hill District, tearing down the mostly African-American neighborhood. Job opportunities are at an all-time low. In Memphis Lee’s diner everyone is fighting to claim what is due to them. Lee refuses to sell his property to the city for anything less than $25,000. Wolf believes that gambling is the best way to make money. Hambone repeats his demands for ham that he was promised many years ago. Sterling, recently released from prison, is looking for a stable job. He is attracted to Risa, the diner’s waitress, who has scarred legs. In a country where racism and oppression fight them every step of the way, where should they put their faith? Holloway believes in visiting a mysterious wise-woman, Aunt Ester, who magically cures problems. Others are lining up on the streets for the funeral of Prophet Samuel, a local leader believed to be sent by God to deliver justice to African Americans. A rally to celebrate the would-be 40th birthday of Malcolm X is also underway. Can Memphis and his customers overcome a broken society and build the American Dream?
Reprinted courtesy of Akhila Khanna and Arena Stage.
EMINENT DOMAIN: (noun): the power of the state to take private property for public use with payment of compensation to the owner (dictionary.com)
One example of the use of eminent domain laws would be a state government seizing homes to build new roads to benefit a larger community. In Two Trains Running the city of Pittsburgh is planning to demolish the building that houses Memphis’ restaurant, and they must pay him for the building. But the city is offering far less than the price Memphis has in mind.
Taji Senior and Rafael Jordan in Two Trains Running
Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr. and David Jennings in Two Trains Running
ABOUT THE PLAYWRIGHT
“There are always and only two trains running. There is life and there is death. Each of us rides them both. To live life with dignity, to celebrate and accept responsibility for your presence in the world is all that can be asked of anyone.”
August Wilson was born Frederick August Kittel to an African-American mother and a German immigrant father in 1945. At 20, Wilson took his mother’s last name because his father had abandoned the family many years earlier. Wilson’s mother raised her six children in a small apartment behind a grocery store in the Hill District of Pittsburgh. Wilson dropped out of school at age 15. Instead, he spent his days reading at the Carnegie Library in Pittsburgh. In 1962 he enlisted in the U.S. Army for three years, but left after one. He worked odd jobs and bought his first typewriter for $20. He began to write poetry and joined a group of artists who created the Centre Avenue Poets Theatre Workshop. In 1979, Wilson wrote Jitney, which he considered his first real play. In 1982, at the National
August Wilson
Playwrights Conference at the O’Neill Theatre Center, he met Lloyd Richards, the dean of the Yale School of Drama, who was also African American. Richards directed Wilson’s first six plays on Broadway. Wilson won Pulitzer Prizes for two of his plays: Fences and The Piano Lesson. Both plays are part of his 10-play Pittsburgh Cycle, also known as the Century Cycle. He died of liver cancer on October 2, 2005. On October 16, 2005 the Virginia Theatre on Broadway was renamed the August Wilson Theatre in his honor.
Reprinted courtesy of Akhila Khanna and Arena Stage.
Jerome Preston Bates, Taji Senior, Rafael Jordan and Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr. in Two Trains Running.
LEADING THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT
The period from 1955 to 1968 is known as the Civil Rights Movement. Though the 13th Amendment officially abolished slavery, it didn’t end discrimination against African Americans or their rights being denied on a day-to-day basis. Different ideas of how to achieve equality and end racial prejudice emerged. At the forefront of the movement were two charismatic leaders — Malcolm X and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. believed in civil disobedience and nonviolent resistance. King was convinced that enduring insults, physical violence, and imprisonment would eventually gain national attention. When he was assassinated in 1968, the nonviolent action thrust of the Civil Rights Movement continued, but with less frequency and publicity.
Malcolm X, on the other hand, believed in self-defense and in a radical, anti-white position. He preached a message of Black Pride, self-help and separatism. The
foremost proponent of Black Power and Black Nationalist philosophies, Malcolm X appealed to the African- American middle class, especially the young. He was a mesmerizing speaker, and his analysis of white racism and hypocrisy also energized poor urban dwellers, ex-convicts, and street people, who had experienced the contempt of white society first hand. He was a member of the Nation of Islam (Black Muslims).
Reprinted courtesy the Seattle Repertory Theatre and the Denver Center Theatre Company
1963 March on Washington. National Archives.
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. speaking. National Archives.
Malcolm X waiting for a press conference to begin on March 26, 1964. U.S. News & World Report Magazine Photograph Collection, Library of Congress.
THE EPIC IN AUGUST WILSON
August Wilson uses mythical elements and spiritual characters who rise from the pages of our classics and religious tomes. He elevates what may appear to be average people living out their mundane lives and shows us that they are epic and important. He is considered a Shakespeare of contemporary American literature. Aunt Ester is an ancient wisewoman who has appeared in several Wilson plays that are part of his Pittsburgh Cycle. Symbolically she is the motherly figure whose legacy captures the several-century long history of African Americans. She was born in 1620, just one year after slaves came to America. In Two Trains Running, she is 322 years old, as old as figures in the Bible. Many characters like Holloway and Sterling believe in her magical powers. She lives behind a red door and helps anyone who comes knocking.
Reprinted courtesy of Akhila Khanna and Arena Stage.
“Aunt Ester give you more than money. She make you right with yourself”
– HOLLOWAY, TWO TRAINS RUNNING
August Wilson’s AMERICAN CENTURY CYCLE
Two Trains Running is a part of August Wilson’s American Century Cycle, an epic 10 play series with one play for each decade of the 20th century. The plays chronicle the African American experience throughout the century, and take place in Pittsburgh’s Hill District, where Wilson grew up — except Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom which takes place in Chicago. Some characters — like Aunt Ester, pictured above in Gem of the Ocean — make appearances (or are mentioned) in multiple plays. While writing through the major events of the 20th century, Wilson zooms in on the daily lives of people and families, living in this community.
Turn the page for a timeline of all 10 plays!
Novella Nelson in Gem of the Ocean (2011).
A timeline of August Wilson’s AMERICAN CENTURY CYCLE
1904 Gem of the Ocean, premiered in 2003
Joniece Abbott-Pratt and Stephen Tyrone Williams in Gem of the Ocean (2011, Hartford Stage).
1911 Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, premiered in 1986
1927 Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, premiered in 1984
1969 Two Trains Running, premiered in 1990
1977 Jitney, premiered in 1982
1985 King Hedley II, premiered in 1999
1997 Radio Golf, premiered in 2005
1936 The Piano Lesson, premiered in 1987
Cleavant Derricks and Elise Taylor in The Piano Lesson (2016, Hartford Stage). .
1948 Seven Guitars, premiered in 1995
1957 Fences, premiered in 1985
Wendell Wright and Wandachristine in Fences (2007, Hartford Stage).
THE HILL DISTRICT OF PITTSBURGH
August Wilson grew up in Pittsburgh’s Hill District: the setting for all but one of the ten plays in his American Century Cycle. In the early 1800s, the Hill District was a hub for immigrant families who came to work in the steel mills during the Industrial Revolution. After slavery ended, many African Americans moved to the Hill District. By the early 1900s, the Hill had become a diverse and vibrant community rich in culture. And then, its infrastructure began to crumble.
Many of the inhabitants of the Hill moved on to other parts of the city, leaving a significant African American majority. In the mid-1900s, the Hill District became a lively network of African American owned shops, restaurants, barbershops, and nightclubs.
In 1955, the federal government approved a redevelopment plan which cleared out 95 acres of homes and business on the Hill and displaced more than 8,000 residents. Meanwhile, the federal government built federally funded public housing. The Hill District had more public housing than any other neighborhood in Pittsburgh.
In the 1960s and 1970s, the Pittsburgh steel industry collapsed, causing rampant unemployment. This was bad news for the Hill District. The crime rates rose and buildings deteriorated from lack of upkeep. Random demolition of these buildings left vacant lots. The demolitions in the 1950s and the demise of the steel industry left a poor and crime-ridden neighborhood, isolated from the rest of the city.
Reprinted courtesy of Akhila Khanna and Arena Stage.
The setting of Two Trains Running may have been based on Eddie’s Restaurant, where Wilson began his writing career. He loved to write in restaurants. Photo by Dick Bernard, 1998.
Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr. and Jeorge Bennett Watson in Two Trains Running
WHO’S WHO IN TWO TRAINS RUNNING
MEMPHIS — A restaurant owner who migrated from the South and built a once thriving business in Pittsburgh’s Hill District. Memphis’ restaurant is now going to be demolished by the city but he is eager that they pay him a fair price for the building.
RISA — The waitress and cook in Memphis’ restaurant. Risa is very beautiful and gets a lot of unwanted attention from men. She has visible scars on her legs from self harm.
HOLLOWAY – A regular at Memphis’ restaurant and an elder in the community. Once a house painter by trade, Halloway is a keen observer and philosopher who has great faith in a local wise woman and spiritual leader called Aunt Ester.
STERLING — Recently released from prison after having robbed a bank. Sterling is interested in the growing Black Power movement and social justice. He is immediately attracted to Risa.
WEST — The successful and wealthy owner/ director of the local funeral parlor. West has offered to buy Memphis’ restaurant to sell it to the city at a profit.
WOLF — A regular at Memphis’ restaurant who uses the payphone there to run an illegal but very popular lottery game.
HAMBONE — Suffering from apparent mental illness, Hambone repeats the phrase “I want my ham” over and over in reference to a ham he was once promised in exchange for work and was never given. Hambone does not have the money to pay for food at the restaurant but Risa gives him what she can anyway.
Godfrey L. Simmons. Jr.
Jerome Preston Bates
Jeorge Bennett Watson
David Jennings
Postell Pringle
Rafael Jordan
Taji Senior
Luck and faith are central topics of conversation amongst the characters. In Two Trains Running, characters put their faith in playing “the numbers game.”
WHAT IS THE NUMBERS GAME?
The numbers game is a form of illegal gambling or lottery played mostly in poor and working-class neighborhoods. To play, a bettor tries to pick three numbers to match those that will be randomly drawn the following day. A numbers runner keeps records of the betting slips, collects money from the bettors and disperses money to the winners. The runner reports back to the numbers bank, or headquarters, of the lottery. If a person guesses correctly, they are said to “hit the numbers” and are entitled to a split of the total money in the pool.
Luck and faith are central topics of conversation amongst the characters. In Two Trains Running, characters put their faith in playing “the numbers game.” The numbers game is a form of illegal gambling or lottery played mostly in poor and working-class neighborhoods. To play, a bettor tries to pick three numbers to match those that will be randomly drawn the following day. A numbers runner keeps records of the betting slips, collects money from the bettors and disperses money to the winners. The runner reports back to the numbers bank, or headquarters, of the lottery. If a person guesses correctly, they are said to “hit the numbers” and are entitled to a split of the total money in the pool.
LISTEN
Reprinted courtesy of Akhila Khanna and Arena Stage.
In an interview August Wilson said that the title of Two Trains Running originates as a lyric in a blues song “Two trains running, neither one going my way. One running by night, one run by day.” Listen to the
What does it mean to have power over your own destiny?
Godfrey L. Simmons, Jr. and Postell Pringle in Two Trains Running.
HARTFORD STAGE EDUCATION PROGRAMS ARE SUPPORTED BY
The BFA Endowed Fund at the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving
Connecticut State Department of Education
Connecticut State Judicial Branch
Enterprise Foundation
Ensworth Charitable Foundation
Mr. & Mrs. William Foulds Family Foundation
Greater Hartford Arts Council
Hartford Foundation for Public Giving
The George A. & Grace L. Long Foundation
The MorningStar Fund at the Hartford Foundation for Public Giving
SBM Foundation
Scripps Family Fund for Education and the Arts
The Michael E. Simmons Foundation
Talcott Resolution
Travelers Foundation
The University of Saint Joseph
SEASON SPONSORS
LEAD PRODUCTION SPONSOR
PRODUCER
Sally Speer
POST-SHOW DISCUSSION SPONSOR
For more information about education programs at Hartford Stage, please call 860-520-7244 or email education@hartfordstage.org.
Production photos by T. Charles Erickson.