Trinity Repertory Company Continues 2019-2020 Season with August Wilson's RADIO GOLF

Trinity Rep continues its 2019-20 Season with the final play from American theatrical legend August Wilson - Radio Golf. Directed by resident acting company member Jude Sandy, the show features resident acting company member Joe Wilson, Jr., as Harmond Wilks, a man determined to revive his childhood neighborhood without considering the emotional cost. Both moving and funny, Radio Golf is the culmination of August Wilson's ten-play American Century Cycle chronicling each decade of African-American life in the twentieth century. Radio Golf runs January 31 - March 1, with press opening on Monday, February 3 at 7:30 pm. Tickets start at $27. More information can be found at www.TrinityRep.com/radiogolf.

August Wilson authored Gem of the Ocean, Joe Turner's Come and Gone, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, The Piano Lesson, Seven Guitars, Fences, Two Trains Running, Jitney, King Hedley II, and Radio Golf. These works explore the heritage and experience of African Americans, decade by decade, over the course of the twentieth century and have been dubbed "The American Century Cycle."

Trinity Rep produced four of August Wilson's American Century Cycle plays before, Radio Golf is the fifth. In the 1987-88 Season, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom was produced, featuring then-resident company member Barbara Meek as Ma Rainey and Ricardo Pitts-Wiley as Levee. Joe Turner's Come and Gone was produced as part of the 1988-89 Season, with Academy Award-winning actor Viola Davis as Mattie Campbell and Barbara Meek as Bertha Holly. Fences was produced in the 1991-92 Season with Barbara Meek as Rose and Ricardo Pitts-Wiley as Jim. The most recent Trinity Rep production of August Wilson was the 2000-01 Season's The Piano Lesson with Ricardo Pitts-Wiley as Doaker and former resident company member Rose Weaver as Berniece.

August Wilson's plays have been produced at regional theaters across the country and all over the world, as well as on Broadway. Wilson garnered many awards, including a Pulitzer Prize for Fences and The Piano Lesson, as well as two Tony Awards (Fences), and multiple New York Drama Critics Circle awards. He is the recipient of a National Humanities Medal and has been inducted into the Black Filmmakers Hall of Fame. Fences was adapted into a 2016 film of the same name featuring former Trinity Rep actor Viola Davis, who won an Academy Award for her performance, and Denzel Washington, reviving the roles they played on Broadway. A film of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, also featuring Viola Davis in the role of Ma Rainey, is planned for 2020.

Real estate developer and entrepreneur Harmond Wilks is determined to become the first Black mayor of Pittsburgh and is on a mission to revive his blighted childhood neighborhood. As Wilks confronts the past, he is forced to question how pursuing change could put his neighborhood's history at risk.

Director Jude Sandy said of Radio Golf "August Wilson is one of American's great literary figures. He trained his lens on subjects of African-American life and on the vast humanity of African-American people with a clarity and devotion that illuminates what is vital in African-American culture and what is universally human in us all. To see August Wilson's plays is to know America in an indispensable way, at times both glorious and heart-wrenching, and always captivating in the rhythm, humor, and poetry he finds in everyday people and everyday life. Radio Golf is Wilson's last play; these are the last words we have from one of America's great playwrights. He was battling terminal liver cancer as he finished this play, and it is no surprise that Radio Golf has powerful strains of the prophetic and the elegiac, all rooted in real human dilemmas and a deep African-American spirituality."

Curt Columbus, The Arthur P. Solomon and Sally E. Lapides artistic director said, "I am beyond excited to see this production, because it brings the powerful, haunting, and beautiful voice of August Wilson back to Trinity Rep after many years of absence. He is one of the most important American Playwrights of the last fifty years, someone who writes exquisitely crafted plays, yet someone who simultaneously challenges how we see the world and the American experience through the medium of theater."

CAST AND CREATIVE TEAM

Jude Sandy returns to the role of director after following the highly-lauded 2018-19 Season production of Marcus Gardley's black odyssey. A resident acting company member since 2016, Sandy most recently appeared in 2019's A Christmas Carol as Ebenezer Scrooge, which was the second-ever highest selling show in Trinity Rep's history. Prior to that, he received great accolades for his work as Seymour in the 2018-19 Season's Little Shop of Horrors. Sandy has also appeared on Broadway, off-Broadway, and is a graduate of the Brown/Trinity Rep MFA program. His acting credits at Trinity Rep include Othello, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Oklahoma!, To Kill a Mockingbird, Blues for Mister Charlie.

Sandy will be working alongside Michael McGarty and Baron E. Pugh (set design), Yao Chen (costume design), Amith Chandrashaker (lighting design), and Larry D. Fowler, Jr. (sound design).

The cast of this production features resident company member Joe Wilson, Jr. as Harmond Wilks. Wilson, Jr. has been a resident acting company member for 16 seasons. His acting credits include The Song of Summer (2018-19 Season), A Christmas Carol as Ebenezer Scrooge (2017-18 Season), The Mountaintop (2016-17 Season), The Grapes of Wrath (2013-14 Season), Cabaret (2009-10 Season), and Topdog/Underdog (2004-05 Season.) Wilson Jr. was co-director of last season's black odyssey, where he was also featured as Ulysses Lincoln.

Ricardo Pitts-Wiley returns to Trinity Rep to play Elder Joseph Barlow. Since first becoming an acting fellow in 1974, Pitts-Wiley has been featured in many productions at Trinity Rep, including August Wilson's Fences, The Piano Lesson, and Ma Rainey's Black Bottom. His last performance with Trinity Rep was 2001's The Cider House Rules directed by Oskar Eustis. In 2017 Ricardo Pitts-Wiley was awarded the Rhode Island Pell Award for Excellence in the Arts by Trinity Rep. He is co-founder of Mixed Magic Theatre in Providence.

Radio Golf will also feature guest artists Tonia Jackson as Mame Wilks. Guest artists Dereks Thomas will play Sterling Johnson, and Omar Robinson will play Roosevelt Hicks. Robinson was last seen at Trinity Rep as Paw Sidin in 2018-19's black odyssey.

AT A GLANCE

August Wilson's Radio Golf

January 31, 2020 - March 1, 2020

Director Jude Sandy

Assistant Directors JaMario Stills and Kevaughn Harvey

Set Designer Michael McGarty and Baron E. Pugh

Costume Designer Yao Chen

Lighting Designer Amith Chandrashaker

Sound Designer Larry D. Fowler, Jr.

Production Stage Manager Meg Tracy Leddy

Cast The cast of this production features resident company member Joe Wilson, Jr. as Harmond Wilks, and guest artists Tonia Jackson as Mame Wilks, Ricardo Pitts-Wiley as Elder Joseph Barlow, Dereks Thomas as Sterling Johnson and Omar Robinson as Roosevelt Hicks.

Pay What You Can Thurs., Jan. 31 at 7:30 pm
Open Caption Performances Sun., Feb. 2 at 2:00 pm

Weds., Feb. 12 at 2:00 and 7:30 pm

Next Generation Night Thurs., Feb. 6 after the show

Teens Talk Fri., Feb. 7 after the show

Context & Conversation Mon., Feb. 10 at 6:00 pm

Book Club Thurs., Feb. 20 at 7:00 pm

Sunday Dinner Sun., March. 1 at 6:00 pm

Website www.TrinityRep.com/radiogolf

Box Office (401) 351-4242; 201 Washington Street

Providence, RI 02903

Group Sales (401) 453-9238; for groups of 10 or more.

Ticket Prices Starting at $27

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