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FencesPart of The August Wilson Century CycleDateline: 8th July, 2008The opening three pages of Fences can act as an object lesson to any aspiring playwright. In that time, one has built up an incredibly detailed picture of Troy Maxson, although it does help to know that he was played by James Earl Jones on Broadway. This man, at 53 four years younger than the century, is large and dignified despite his menial job as a garbage collector. He is strong willed and has protested to management about the fact that black workers are not allowed to drive garbage trucks. On a more personal level, despite denials to his friend Bono, he clearly has at the very least an eye for the ladies, which is not quite managed to suppress during his marriage to Rose. This miracle of economic exposition leads into the story of a former baseball star whose opportunities were blocked by his colour but now has an chance to stand up for himself and his people, at least in a small way. As author, journalist and academic Samuel G. Feldman points out in his foreword, Fences was the most successful of Wilson's plays commercially, playing on Broadway for around a year and a half and winning both a Tony award and a Pulitzer. The attraction is the warts and all portrayal of a central character who seems entirely realistic, in part because he was apparently drawn from members of Wilson's own extended family. He may only be a garbage collector but Troy is continually fascinating with biases and predilections pre-programmed by his own and his people's history. At his best, he is a loving, caring man who brings joy to a wife who cannot believe her luck in being married to him for eighteen years. He is also a champion of his people, albeit on the smallest of scales. At his worst, though, Troy Maxson seems intent on destroying the ambitions of his talented young son, Cory, seemingly through jealousy although actually his reasoning is far deeper. Again, when he not only takes up with a younger woman but makes her pregnant, his underlying rationale makes sense, if one ignores the cruelty that he imposes on his family. By the end, despite overwhelming weaknesses, this larger-than-life character emerges as sympathetic if not entirely likeable and it seems certain that the positive elements of his life will live on in the legacy carried forward by his children from three different liaisons. Fences is not as deep and mystical as some of August Wilson's other plays but it is not difficult to see why it is the most immediately appealing to those lucky enough to see it on stage. Philip Fisher
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