Événement

Topdog/Underdog

Topdog/Underdog, by Suzan-Lori Parks, is a play about two African American brothers struggling to make ends meet. Abandoned by their parents when they were teenagers, Lincoln and Booth, now in their thirties, were forced to learn to survive relying only on themselves. Lincoln, nicknamed Link, supported himself for many years of his life by hustling people at three card monte. However, after one hustle turns sour and his partner is killed, Lincoln swears off hustling and vows to earn an honest living. His wife Cookie kicks him out of their home, and Lincoln moves in with his younger brother Booth in his small, barely furnished, single room apartment. Lincoln contributes to the rent by working as an Abraham Lincoln impersonator at a local arcade, where patrons pay to re-enact Lincolns assassination, shooting him in the back of the head with a cap gun.

Topdog/Underdog deals with a number of different themes including: family relationships and responsibilities, poverty, and the difference between honest and dishonest ways of making a living. Perhaps the most dominant theme, however, is that of coming to terms with ones own identity. Although Link has disavowed the life of a hustler, he is unable to cultivate a stable and sustainable life for himself doing honest work. The job he works after giving up three card monte, that of an Abraham Lincoln impersonator, may be legal, but ultimately it involves a kind of deception and dishonesty as exemplified by the fact that the management at the arcade instructs Link to wear whiteface to work so that the looks more like the real Abraham Lincoln. At the end of the day there are certain aspects of a persons character that are inescapable.