- In typical August Wilson fashion, the play begins with a whole bunch of stage directions.
- We're told that we're in the Maxson family's yard.
- Their ancient brick house is set off of an alley in a city neighborhood.
- There's a wooden porch that needs to be painted really badly.
- Some old beat-up chairs sit on the porch.
- There's a half-built fence around the dirt yard.
- Tools and lumber sit in a pile.
- A ball made of rags hangs from the tree.
- A baseball bat leans against the tree.
- It's 1957.
- Troy Maxson and Bono enter the yard in the middle of a conversation.
- Both men are black.
- We're told that Troy is a big guy.
- Bono has been Maxson's best friend for 33 years.
- It's Friday night – payday.
- It's the one night of the week where the two friends drink and hang out.
- Troy and Bono are dressed for their jobs as garbage collectors.
- At long last, the dialogue begins.
- Troy and Bono are discussing a recent complaint that Troy has made at work.
- Maxson evidently asked his boss, Mr. Rand, why all the black men put the garbage in the trucks, while the white men get to drive.
- Bono worries that the white management will drum up some reason to fire Troy.
- It doesn't seem like Troy is too afraid of this.
- He's just looking for equality and feels like he deserves it.
- Bono mentions that Troy has been talking to a certain lady, Alberta, at the bar a lot lately.
- He seems concerned that Troy might be having an affair.
- Bono also points out that he's seen Troy walking around Alberta's house.
- Troy denies that he's messing around with Alberta.
- He says he's stopped chasing after women ever since he's been married to his wife, Rose.
- Bono asks where Alberta is from.
- Tallahassee, says Troy.
- His friend comments that Alberta is "big and healthy." She's got "big old legs and hips as wide as the Mississippi River" (1.1.36).
- Troy says that legs don't matter. It's "them hips [that] cushion the ride!... Like you riding on Goodyears!" (1.1.37-1.1.39).
- Rose enters.
- Stage directions tell us that she's ten years younger than Troy.
- She's devoted to him, in part, because her life without him would be no good.
- Rose also recognizes that Troy has a good spirit despite his faults.
- Troy's wife asks what Troy and Bono are talking about.
- Troy tells her it's "men talk" (1.1.42).
- Rose asks Bono if he wants supper.
- He tells her he'll eat supper at home. He's looking forward to his wife's pot of pig feet.
- Troy says he wants to go eat pig feet with Bono.
- He teases Rose, asking if what she's cooking can top it.
- She's got chicken and collard greens cooking.
- Troy tells his wife to go back inside so the man-talk can continue.
- He makes sexually suggestive remarks to Rose, teasing her, saying she needs to go inside and "powder it up" so she'll be ready for him later on that night (1.1.47).
- Rose tells him not to talk like that.
- Troy affectionately puts his arm around his wife.
- He says that when he first met Rose, he told her he didn't want to marry her; he just wanted to be her man.
- He prods Rose to tell Bono what she responded.
- Rose says she told Troy, "if he wasn't the marrying kind, then move out the way so the marrying kind could find me" (1.1.50).
- Troy says he thought this over for two or three days.
- Rose corrects him, saying he came back the same night.
- Jokingly, Troy tells Bono that he promised to put a rooster in the backyard. This way he'd know if any other men were sneaking out the backdoor when he came home from work.
- Rose tells him not to talk like that.
- Troy says the only problem was when they first got married, they didn't have a backyard.
- Bono talks about the first house he and his wife lived in.
- There were only two rooms with an outhouse in the back.
- It was freezing cold when the winter wind blew.
- He wonders why they stayed there six years.
- Bono says he thought only white people could get better things.
- Rose says a lot of people don't realize they can do better.
- For example, people still shop at Bella's, when the A&P is way cheaper.
- Troy says he's treated right at Bella's and that's why he shops there.
- The only good thing about the A&P is that the grocery store gave his son, Cory, a job.
- Money has been tight around the house since Troy's brother, Gabe, moved out.
- Rose mentions that Cory has been recruited by a college football team.
- Troy is totally against this.
- He says that the white man won't let Cory go anywhere in the sports world.
- He thinks his son ought to be learning a trade instead of focusing on sports.
- Rose tells her husband that it's a real honor for their son to be recruited.
- Bono comments that if Cory is as good at football as Troy was at baseball then the boy will do alright.
- Troy says that despite his skills at baseball he's still poor.
- His wife tells him that times have changed since he played baseball – now black people are allowed to play in the major leagues.
- Bono says that Troy just "[came] along too early" (1.1.77).
- "There ought not never have been no time called too early!" says Troy.
- He talks about how his batting average was way higher than Selkirk's, a guy who played right field for the Yankees back then.
- Rose comments that people just had to wait for Jackie Robinson to come along.
- Her husband says, "Jackie Robinson wasn't nobody" and that he "know[s] teams Jackie Robinson couldn't even make!" (1.1.82).
- Troy complains that it should never have mattered what color you were.
- If you were good at baseball, they should've let you play.
- He takes a long swig from a bottle of gin.
- Rose warns him that he's going to drink himself to death.
- Her husband says he isn't afraid of Death. He compares it to "a fastball on the outside corner" (1.1.84).
- Back in the day, he could knock one of those right out of the park.
- Troy continues, saying he's not afraid of Death because he's wrestled with him.
- He saw Death's cold army marching straight at him.
- Rose says all this was a hallucination of Troy's when he had a really bad case of pneumonia.
- Troy tells them that he grabbed Death's sickle and threw it over a hill.
- He wrestled Death for three days and nights until Death finally gave up.
- Death told Troy that he would be back.
- Troy realizes that Death will get him someday, but he's not going out without a fight.
- Bono remarks that Troy has "got more stories than the Devil's got sinners" (1.1.101).
- Troy says he's seen the devil too.
- Troy's son, Lyons, enters.
- Stage directions tell us that Lyons is Troy's son from a previous marriage.
- Troy suggests that Lyons only came by to get some money.
- Lyons replies that he just came by to say hello, since he was in the neighborhood.
- Troy thinks his son was in the neighborhood because he knows Troy got paid today.
- Lyons says, "Well, hell, since you mentioned it... let me have ten dollars" (1.1.116).
- His father tells him he'd rather "go to hell and play blackjack with the devil" (1.1.117).
- Bono asks Troy to tell the story about when he met the devil.
- Troy says that happened a while ago, when he needed some furniture.
- He went to the furniture store and tried get some on credit, but they wouldn't help him out.
- The next think you know a white man showed up at the door out of nowhere.
- The man told Troy he'd give him three rooms worth of furniture as long as he paid ten dollars a month.
- If Troy didn't pay, then the man would come back and take the furniture.
- Troy says that this man must've been the devil.
- Bono asks how long Troy has been paying the ten dollars.
- Troy tells him it's been fifteen years.
- Rose butts in and calls Troy out for making the whole story up.
- She says Troy doesn't pay ten dollars a month to anybody and that they got their furniture from a dude named Mr. Glickman.
- Troy laughs it off, saying Bono knows he wouldn't ever be as a big a fool as to pay somebody that much for some furniture.
- His wife tells him he should stop talking about dealing with the devil. He ought to be worried about what God's going to say on judgment day.
- Lyons asks again for the ten dollars.
- Troy gives him a hard time about it, saying Lyons ought to get a job.
- Lyons says he's too busy playing music.
- Troy implies that Lyons' mother did a bad job raising him.
- Lyons tells his father that he should've been around when he was growing up -- then maybe he would've been raised better.
- Rose encourages Troy to give Lyons the ten dollars.
- Her husband tells her to give it to Lyons.
- She says she will, as soon as Troy gives her his earnings for the week.
- He hands his money to her and she gives Lyons the ten dollars.
- Lyons tells them both thank you and heads off.
- Troy complains that Lyons is 34 and doesn't have a real job.
- Bono says he has to go home – his wife is waiting.
- Troy puts his arm around Rose and says how much he loves her.
- He tells Bono that soon he and Rose will be getting it on, and drunkenly brags that they'll probably still be getting in on come Monday morning.