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“Fences” film for Black History Month
February 26 @ 7:30 pm – 10:00 pm MST
by Carolyn Classen, blogger
FEBRUARY 26 AT 7:30PM
Regular Admission Prices
Passes Accepted
“Join us for a big screen presentation of the 2016 drama Fences, directed by/starring Denzel Washington and co-starring Viola Davis in her Oscar-winning role, in celebration of the 40th anniversary of August Wilson’s original 1985 Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning stage play!
In Fences, Denzel Washington stars as Troy Maxson, a working-class African American father trying to provide for his family during the 1950s while coming to terms with his life. As a Pittsburgh-based sanitation worker, Maxson mulls over his crushed dreams of becoming a professional baseball player when Major League Baseball first admitted Black players. While bitter over his missed opportunity, he creates tension within his family, clashing with his wife Rose (Viola Davis), and denying his son Cory (Jovan Adepo) the opportunity to meet a college football recruiter and pursue his own dreams. Nominated for four Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actor (Washington), Best Adapted Screenplay (August Wilson, adapting his own acclaimed 1985 stage play), and a Best Supporting Actress win for Davis, Fences is a passionate, powerful look at race, family and the American Dream. (Dir. by Denzel Washington, 2016, USA, 139 mins., Rated PG-13)“
Carolyn’s note: Saw this film recently again and related to the lost dreams (Negro baseball league) and struggles of Troy, with his 8 to 5 pm job on a sanitation truck. He was previously a teen run away, a thief and ex-con. His life is about his relationships with his mentally disabled younger brother (war injury), his illegitimate first son (an unemployed muscian), his wife and 2nd son (wannabe professional/ high school football player), and later his daughter by an affair. Troy has to build a wooden fence in the yard of their Pittsburg home, but is it to keep people in or out? Both husband and wife win Best Actor and Actress awards for enduring this difficult marriage and their commitment to each other. It is truly a movie about the American dream of betterment for Black Americans, and others.