August Wilson’s Fences at Trinity Rep Offers a Fresh Take on an American Classic

Kelvin Roston Jr. as Troy Maxson and Jackie Davis as Rose in Fences. (Photo by Marisa Lenardson)

It’s not the first of August Wilson’s plays to come to the Trinity Repertory stage in recent years, but according to the cast and crew, this one might be the most memorable.

Fences holds its official opening night Wednesday, March 27, after opening for previews last week. The American classic, described as the magnum opus of Wilson’s oeuvre, follows former Negro League baseball player Troy Maxson (Kelvin Roston Jr.) in his post-glory days gig as a sanitation worker in 1950s-era Pittsburgh. Maxson’s wife, Rose (Jackie Davis), and sons, Cory (Nicholas Byers) and Lyons (Rodney Witherspoon, II), as well as his best friend, Jim Bono (Dereks Thomas), feature prominently in this story about the bonds of love and family amid a world where class and race seem like the only determiners in life.

The show follows other recent Wilson productions, including Gem of the Ocean in 2022 and Radio Golf in 2020. The play was also adapted into an Academy Award-nominated film in 2016, with Rhode Island’s own Viola Davis winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her role opposite Denzel Washington.

Trinity Rep’s version, directed by Christopher Windom, features costumes by Kenisha Kelly and an otherworldly set design by Lex Liang. Jackie Davis, who portrays Rose, spoke with Rhode Island Monthly during rehearsal to share her experience with what she says has been a “dream role.” Keep reading for insight into a show that remains as poignant for modern audiences as it was at its first staging in 1985. The production runs through April 28. trinityrep.com

This interview has been lightly edited for length and clarity.

How did you prepare for this role? Have you had any experience with August Wilson’s plays?

I actually understudied the role at the Huntington Theatre a long time ago. I want to say maybe twenty years ago. I also teach his monologues at Wheaton College and Boston Conservatory, and they’re great monologues to work with. I’ve seen at least three or four plays from the canon.

I’ve been in love with Rose since I understudied it at the Huntington. It’s just one of those roles. It has been a dream role to have it — just rereading it and relating to her now at this age, in this body, with this life and understanding the complexities a little more of their relationship.

For a lot of people, their first reference to this show is the film that came out in 2016, which of course we saw Rose played by Central Falls’ own Viola Davis. What is that like, going into this role knowing that such a prominent of actress from this state has played it before?

To be honest, she’s played it more than once. She’s played it onstage as well. My reference for this work as a theater artist is always theater, but to know that I get to share a sisterhood with someone with the same last name from the same town is a wonderful thing. I will say I have not watched the film, so I have no frame of reference, and I did not see her play it onstage. So this is Jackie Davis’ Rose, and that’s what I’m very proud of and looking forward to.

Are you from Central Falls as well?

I live here now. I was born in Jamaica. I was born on my tiny little island and I grew up in Boston and I moved to Rhode Island in 2011. And I’ve claimed it, so it’s now my home.

Nicholas Byers as Cory and Kelvin Roston Jr. as Troy Maxson in Fences. (Photo by Mark Turek)

How did you come to be involved with Trinity Rep?

Through Shura Baryshnikov [head of movement and physical theater for the Brown-Trinity MFA program], who reached out to introduce me to the education department in 2012. I’m one of the instructors for Trinity’s Education Department’s Young Actors Summer Institute. I’m a teacher there doing dance and movement. That was my initial entryway, and then Joe Wilson Jr. did the Every 28 Hours workshop and I did some work with that and then I was cast in black odyssey, which this shirt actually is from. Curt [Columbus, Laura H. Harris artistic director,] invited me to be a member of the acting company last year. I’ve been involved with Trinity Rep since 2012 and as an actress since 2019.

What were some of the challenges when you and the cast were working on this show?

I would say the regular challenges of being a human being trying to hold your family together and relating to that and relating to seeing someone you love making some choices that have tremendous effects on not just their life, but other lives. And I’m not even speaking about Rose particularly, just how one person’s choice affects his friendships, his platonic friendship with his best friend, his relationship with his wife, his relationship with his sons, and just seeing how we as human beings travel down that path of empathy, of disappointment, of heartbreak. And as actors, your somatic system can’t tell if this is real or imagined, so it’s ‘How do you place and reset?’ There’s a lot of that. Being in place and resetting to go to the next place. That is challenging for an actor.

How do you get in the right mindset when you’re working on the show?

What I encourage young actors is it’s not even a mindset, it’s trusting the text and trusting the work and letting the text guide you through the work. And when you’re done with that string of text, breathing deep and resetting to be able to go again.

What has the dynamic been like among the cast?

Kelvin and I, we have really great chemistry. I also have to say just in general, the cast — Christopher has done an amazing job along with Gia [Yarn] who helped with the casting, she’s our production associate — they have gathered a tremendous group of human beings in a room who are in love with the process and each other. And we hold each other up. This includes everyone from the actors to the understudies — who are also actors — and all of the production team.

What do you think this play has to say to contemporary audiences?

I think it’s a timeless American play. Especially in the sense that it’s family and love, so if you are a human and you are a parent or a child or a friend, a spouse, you can relate. I don’t think those things change. I think that’s universal.

Martinez Napoleon as Gabriel and Jackie Davis as Rose in Fences. (Photo by Marisa Lenardson)

What would you like audiences to be thinking and feeling when they’re seeing this play performed onstage?

I want them to see, to think, to remember that at the core of everything is love, and if you have love and if you are willing to fight for it, you can endure. And to have a spirit and sense of grace and empathy. And if you can mind all of those things, you can get to the next step of whatever challenge you’re confronted with.

Is there anything you want audiences to have in mind before they go into it?

It’s a very different Fences. It’s not a Fences that you’ve seen before, but it’s the same Fences. Be ready to do all the things that you do when you see it — you laugh, you cry, you get frustrated — but know that you’re in for a treat. I like to say, ‘It ain’t your mama’s Fences.’

Is there anything else you wanted to share about your own background and how you approach the acting process?

I just think I’m a regular everyday neurotic piece of putty, and I don’t know if I do have a process. It takes me forever to learn words; I’m the queen of paraphrasing. One of my students asked me why am I always so happy, and I said because I love what I do. I love what I do, I’m so lucky that I get to play for work. And this role has been a role that I have been waiting and wanting and praying and hoping for, and then I got it. And I was like, ‘Oh baby, they should think about other people. Maybe I was wrong.’ But I’m so grateful to have been given this opportunity, and I hope to give Rose the life she deserves.

When did you find out you got the part?

It was a while after I auditioned. I have a piece of rose quartz that I just kept in a pocket of whatever I had on. My sister who passed away in 2017, she had made me this rose quartz ring that I wear every day. The only reason I don’t have it on [now] is because it’s in the rehearsal room. I’ve just carried rose with me since I was cast.

Lex Liang’s set design in Fences. (Photo by Mark Turek)

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