Join Allentown Public Theatre this Tuesday, February 16, at 7pm for an informal evening at Hava Java Cafe as actors read Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lori Parks.
The play follows the sibling rivalry of two thirty-something African-American brothers, Lincoln and Booth, as they cope with women, hustling, work, and their troubled upbringing.
After their parents deserted the boys at 16 and 11, they depended on each other.
To support themselves now, Lincoln has taken a job as an Abraham Lincoln impersonator, while Booth tries to become a card shark at three-card monte. Roy Shuler and Anthony Smith, Jr. play the brothers; Diedre Johnson narrates.Topdog/Underdog is part of the series, Voices of Conscience: Toward Racial Understanding. See below for another offering this month in this series.
Suzan-Lori Parks has won many awards for Topdog/Underdog, and is the first African-American woman to receive the Pulitzer Prize (2002) for drama.
She was born in Kentucky and lived in Germany during her adolescence. There she realized "what it feels like to be neither white nor black, but simply foreign." Anna Russell, who directs the reading, calls the play "a powerful story about social issues and divides [written] in a way that is accessible yet unconventional."
WHEN: February 16, 7pmWHERE: Hava Java Cafe526 N. 19th St., AllentownSuggested donation of $5