Radio Golf

Infobox Play
name = Radio Golf


image_size = 150px
caption =
writer = August Wilson
series = "The Pittsburgh Cycle"
genre = Drama
setting = the Hill District of Pittsburgh, 1969
subject = a charming and powerful African American politician, running for the highest office of his career
premiere = 8 May 2007
place = Cort Theatre
New Haven, Connecticut
orig_lang = English
web = http://www.radiogolfonbroadway.com/
ibdb_id = 456784

"Radio Golf" is a play by American playwright, August Wilson, the final installment in his ten-part series, "The Pittsburgh Cycle". It was first performed in 2005 by the Yale Repertory Theatre in New Haven, Connecticut and staged its Broadway premiere on 8 May 2007 at the Cort Theatre in New York City.

Plot

Harmond Wilks, an Ivy League-educated lawyer with an educated and ambitious wife, wants to redevelop the "blighted" area of the Hill District in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.

Having inherited a prosperous real estate firm from his father and grandfather, Wilks is about to declare his candidacy to be Pittsburgh's first black mayor. Meanwhile, he and his friend Roosevelt Hicks are engineering a development deal on Wylie Avenue to build a high-rise apartment building with a ground floor filled with high-end chain stores like Starbucks, Whole Foods, and Barnes & Noble.

The deal depends on federal money, which requires a finding that the area is blighted. There are offstage city politics and backroom deals. Harmond and Roosevelt, a newly-minted Mellon Bank vice president, think they are equal competitors in capitalism's public-private arena, but they may just be black front men for white money.

Suddenly another world intrudes when an old mansion at 1839 Wylie they have slated for demolition turns out to have a significant past. It was the home of Aunt Ester, the hereditary folk priestess whose tale goes back to 1619, when the first shipload of African slaves was brought to Virginia.

Productions

After the 2005 world premiere of "Radio Golf" at the Yale Repertory Theatre, it was presented on the West Coast by the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, California, the Huntington Theatre Company in Boston, Massachusetts in October 2006, and McCarter Theatre in 2007.

The staging at the Cort Theatre, was also the place where Wilson's first Broadway play, "Ma Rainey's Black Bottom," opened in 1984. Chicago's Goodman Theatre is the first to mount a production of the complete ten play "The Pittsburgh Cycle" with the closing of "Radio Golf" in early 2007.

Broadway Producers: Jujamcyn Theaters, Margo Lion, Jeffrey Richards/Jerry Frankel, Tamara Tunie/Wendell Pierce, Fran Kirmser, Bunting Management Group, George Frontiere and Open Pictures, Lauren Doll/Steven Greil & The August Wilson Group, Wondercity Inc., Townsend Teague, Jack Viertel, Gordon Davidson

Awards and nominations

;Awards
* 2007 New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Play;Nominations
* 2007 Drama Desk Award for Best Play
* 2007 Drama League Award for Distinguished Production of a Play
* 2007 Outer Critics Circle Award for Outstanding Play
* 2007 Tony Award for Best Play

References

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Further reading

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External links

* [http://www.radiogolfonbroadway.com "Radio Golf" official website]
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