Cover

Acclaim for Dael Orlandersmith’s

Yellowman

“By turns prophetic and affirmative, Yellowman is a battle cry for humanity and its possibilities…. The playwright’s sense of cosmic sweep leads inexorably to an agonizingly contemporary view of fate and tragedy.”

—The New York Times

“A beautiful coming-of-age tale…. Both a celebration of young love and a harrowing study of smoldering domestic violence, the play is both heartwarming and ultimately heartbreaking…. Orlandersmith is clearly in love with words. Her picturesque reminiscences describe visions of both rural South Carolina and the big city. The play has a flowing, cinematic texture.”

—Daily Variety Gotham

“Maybe Dael Orlandersmith’s plays will continue to improve exponentially. While The Gimmick was impressive, Yellowman may very well be twice as good.”

—The Star-Ledger

About the Author

Dael Orlandersmith

Yellowman

My Red Hand, My Black Hand

Dael Orlandersmith presented her first play, Liar, Liar, in New York in 1994, and since then has written several others, including Beauty’s Daughter, which appeared at the American Place Theatre and won an Obie Award in 1995; Monster, which was presented to critical acclaim at the New York Theatre Workshop in 1996; and The Gimmick, which she performed at the New York Theatre Workshop in 1999. She won the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize and was a finalist for the 2002 Pulitzer Prize in Drama for Yellowman and is the recipient of a New York Foundation for the Arts Fellowship and the Helen Merrill Award for Emerging Playwrights.

ALSO BY DAEL ORLANDERSMITH

Beauty’s Daughter, Monster, The Gimmick

Title Page

Dedication

To Blanka Zizka, Howard W. Overshown,
Paul Douglas Michnewiecz, Janice Paran, Emily Mann,
Robert Blacker, and the rest of the Sundance Theatre Lab,
my aunt Marion Thomas–and to the adults
who’ve forgotten–the Dream!

Part 1 - Yellowman

Yellowman

PRODUCTION CREDITS

Yellowman was originally commissioned and developed by McCarter Theatre and produced by McCarter Theatre, Wilma Theater, and Long Wharf Theatre. It was developed in part with the support of the Sundance Theatre Laboratory.

It was first produced by McCarter Theatre, Princeton, New Jersey, on January 10, 2002, with the following cast:

ALMA Dael Orlandersmith
EUGENE Howard W. Overshown

Director Blanka Zizka
Set designer Klara Zieglerova
Costume designer Janus Stefanowicz
Lighting designer Russell H. Champa
Composer Elliott Sharp
Dialect coach Charlotte Fleck
Dramaturg Janice Paran
Resident producer Mara Isaacs
Production stage manager Paul-Douglas Michnewicz

It was originally produced in New York City by the Manhattan Theatre Club.

CHARACTER NOTES

ALMA: Large-sized but in proportion, medium-brown complexion, strong-featured. Age range can be from 38 to 43.

EUGENE: Tall, lithe-bodied, almost feminine-featured. Extremely light-skinned man, age range 40 to 48.

Yellowman is a two-character play where the actors also play other characters. There are times when certain things in the narration don’t have to be said, just acted out. The character-switching should be done quickly adroitly. The space is bare except for two chairs on a raked stage, which indicates the distance between the characters. Note the opening monologue is the play’s prologue, which leads them into the schoolyard. The last two monologues are the epilogue. It is the bareness of the stage, save the chairs, that makes the musicality of the piece play.

PART I

(Alma sits in a chair upper stage right on a raised platform talking directly to audience except when indicated)

ALMA: There’s a fluidity to the heat in South Carolina/watching certain objects–maybe certain fields of cotton, corn, tobacco/there seems to be some sort of rippling effect. My mother/women like my mother and her mother before her talked about the sun–staying in it too long creates illusion/they–my mother/women like her and more than likely her mother before her talked in Gullah/Geechie accents about how (VOICE) “da sun can make ya see tings dat ain’t dere” or “dat heat is sumpin ya hear.” (ALMA) Her statements always seemed to end in questions. There were always question marks at the end of her observations as if she wasn’t entirely sure of what she felt, heard, saw–moreover they weren’t entirely sure as to whether they were entitled to hear, think, or see–truly see. The question marks at the end of their statements were from women who knew their place and the fact that they had opinions about something as simple as sunrays pulled them from their place–the fact that they would question ANYTHING made them “uppity” in the eyes of their peers.

My mother women like my mother and her mother before her toiled/tugged the soil right beside the men. They were dark therefore not considered pretty/they were dark and large–therefore sexless. They were sometimes bigger than the men/their bodies filling space/in their dresses as they toiled, they looked awkward/they wore dresses in work–heat for a semblance of femininity/in heat and toil they craved softness, pliability thinking somehow it would appeal to some man when in fact their sweaty dresses made them seem bigger/more awkward and the fact that they did not carry their bigness with pride–with their large heads and backs in total alignment, they were to be pitied.

They continued to tug/toil the soil right beside the men–they cursed and prayed in their Gullah/Geechie voices/their Ball n’ Chain voices/their Gullah/Geechie/Ball n’ Chain voices/Ma Rainey/Bessie Smith does the Hucklebuck with Big Mama Thornton and (VOICE) “Oh praise God/help me Lawd git thru another day.” (ALMA) Always my mother/her mother before her praised God not for living/not for happiness/they did not live/they were not happy–they existed and they praised Him not totally sure whether or not He existed. They did so because they were taught to/had to and that there had to be some love somewhere if they prayed long enough/hard enough. There was no love for them on this plane/earthly plane so they praised and prayed in their Gullah/Geechie/voices for a space–no matter how meager in heaven. In heaven they would be seen/loved/not big/ugly/and black in heaven/in heaven they’d be thin/light and beautiful. Here on earth the men beat them/leave them/they ride them/they don’t make love to them/they ride them/the men/always on top/like my father/they rode on top/they rode/they entered/they shot their seed/then left them.

My mother/women like my mother and her mother before her took it/ate it/accepted it as (ODELIA) “one o’ dem tings dat mens does do to womens.” (ALMA) They/felt they deserved no more/no more than that/they felt it was their due for being big, awkward, poor, and dark. This is what my mother/her mother before her believed/they believed had they been born “rich and high yella,” they wouldn’t have suffered/they thanked God that I wasn’t born dark/although too bad I wasn’t lighter/but they thanked God I wasn’t dark. My mother and her mother before her believed/if only they could be light/light and rich/if they could marry a light-skinned man, they’d be loved.

(Lights come up on Eugene, who sits in a chair downstage left. He talks to the audience unless otherwise indicated)

EUGENE: My father was a big, big man and there was something about that bigness–especially if you’re a child in the south. I watched my father and men like my father. Black southern men seemed incredibly big–especially men who labored in heat or knew about that heat/sweat of Black men in the south/the sweat just dripping off their bodies/their big bodies–particularly darker/dark men. Man, there was something about that bigness that jet black bigness/that down home bigness/old-time stuff like John Henry or somebody’s Robert Johnson song–even though that was way before his time but not really before his time/John Henry/Robert Johnson and Hallelujah or moreover in my father’s vocabulary–“nigger-stuff–jet black niggerstuff.” (Pause) He was big, dark, handsome–my father? Oh yeah, my father was handsome. He didn’t know it–that he was handsome. Like many dark men who didn’t know they were handsome. (Beat)

Sometimes he–my father–would look in the mirror and say “the finest man that ever walked.” He’d laugh but really he wouldn’t laugh. I’d watch him and the laughter would disappear and he’d turn to–rather on me/he’d turn on me and I was about nine–maybe ten but I think I was nine and he said (ROBERT) “Do you think I’m handsome Eugene?” and I said (EUGENE) “Yeah Daddy.” Then he stood over me/towering over me in all his blackness and said with incredible menace (ROBERT) “Do you think I’d be more handsome if I was high yella like you?” (EUGENE) and I gasped you know and inside I’m crying/screaming and another part of me wants to hurt him, hit him and I balled my fists/balled them and he looks down at me and there’s bourbon in him/all day he’d been at it/the bourbon but you’d never know it/that he had bourbon in him unless you knew him well and could smell it. Via this bourbon, all the anger came to and at me. He–my father–“Robert Gaines” as he referred to himself when in his bourbon got mad–real mad and when that happened, the Geechie/Gullah came out. The standard English that he had so painstakingly studied to rid himself of Russelville/cutting wood for Georgia Pacific/that thing in him that would make him feel that he was the darkest and ugliest of all men would come back to him and he in turn would throw it on to me. (Pause) So he looks down on me/at me. (ROBERT) “You wanna fight me high yella, huh? You wanna fight? I think your best bet high yella is to get outta my face before I hurt you/cause I will knock your high yella/red ass down!” (Pause) (EUGENE) I looked up at Daddy’s face/his dark, dark face/his mysterious, handsome face and he looked at my light face–my eyes were very open–very wide and within that moment the night before us became very thick between us. My light face looked up at his dark one and he winced–actually winced because as small as I was and as terrified as I was, I also hated him and we both knew within that moment, in a weird way, my hatred was going to rear its head. Somehow we both knew my hatred was stronger than his 6′4′′ frame and within that moment his physical stature meant nothing at all. (Pause) My hate was strong but it always is, isn’t it? Hate I mean–pure unadulterated hate.

ALMA: Eugene and I were young once–in the sixties we were young children in the schoolyard. All of us were young in the schoolyard playing. All of us (CHILD ALMA) “Hot peas n’ butta–come and git yo suppa!”

EUGENE: (CHILD EUGENE) (Sings) “Miss Mary Mack Mack, Mack–all dressed in black black, black”–

BOTH: (Sing) “With silver buttons, buttons, buttons all down her back, back, back.”

ALMA: (Beat) I was seven when I first laid eyes on Gene. I saw this little boy–a little older than us–he was nine and in the fourth grade. He looked like he was wearing a suit.

EUGENE: It wasn’t a suit.

ALMA: There was the formality of a suit. I went over to him. “Why you wearin’ a suit to come to school? All o’ us is playin’ an stuff–you don’t never play wit nobody. I see you by ya self all the time–you wanna play wit us? I know you in the fourth grade but you can be wit us.”

EUGENE: It was a button-down shirt. It was my favorite shirt and I felt good wearing it. “I’m not wearing a suit. I’m wearing my favorite shirt and that’s why and I don’t care about me being in the fourth grade and you being in the second grade–I want to play with you.” I wanted to say “Let’s be friends. I see you all the time in the schoolyard and everybody likes you. EVERYBODY–how do you make everybody like you? How do you make people like you?” That’s what I wanted to say but I was a child and I didn’t know how.

ALMA: I ask him his name and he says–

EUGENE: Eugene Robert Gaines.

ALMA: He says his whole name–

EUGENE: Eugene Robert Gaines.

ALMA: “You talk funny. Not funny like ‘laugh’ funny–you does talk nice. You talk like people on t.v. talk. You don’t talk like none o’ us. You does talk good–I like it.” Then we played–

BOTH: “Hot peas and butter, come and git yo suppa.” We played and yelled and played–

EUGENE: That day I met Alton White. He was friends with Alma first and he just sort of comes up to me. He sees me talking to Alma and just comes up smiling. This small dark boy with dark eyes and a wide, great smile–not malicious in the least. He has a great smile. I look down at him and say “I’m Eugene Robert Gaines. What’s your name?” He looks up at me and says (ALTON) “My name is Alton–Alton White.” (EUGENE) We play at lunch and Alton says (ALTON) “Eugene let’s play after school.” (EUGENE) I say “What do you want to play?” He grins. (ALTON) “I wanna play Batman.” (EUGENE) I say “Okay–does that mean that I play Robin?” He says (ALTON) “You wanna play Batman?” (EUGENE) I say “Yeah.” (ALTON) “Okay.”

My heart is beating. My heart never beats like this except when Daddy yells but this is a different kind of heartbeat. This day–the way my heart beats this day is thrilling. There’s a raucous, thrilling rhythm in my chest. So we meet after school and Alton comes running out of the school wearing glasses with the arms of his sweater tied around him like a cape and runs straight over to me as Robin. (ALTON) “Holy flyin’ fish Batman! Gotham City is in trouble!” (EUGENE) “Okay Robin–don’t panic. I can tell the Joker had something to do with this–probably with the help of Catwoman”–

ALMA: (Makes Catwoman’s gesture and sound) “Meow.”

ALMA: Alton, Eugene, and I are inseparable. I end up playing what they always want to play which is Batman or they’d trade Spider-Man comic books. I hate playing Catwoman. “Why I haveta play her? I wanna play the Joker or the Riddler. I don’t wanna play no Catwoman! She ain’t cool. I ain’t ga play her no more–y’all make me sick!” One day some other kids from Russelville see us playing. One of them says (VOICE 1) “Oh you an Alton playin’ wit dat ole yella boy from St. Stephen. Y’all don play wit us no more–y’all like him cause he yella an rich an live in da city limits.” (Eugene stops singing) (ALMA) I say “I play wit who I wanna play wit an y’all need to mind y’all business–Gene is my friend just like Alton my friend!” (VOICE 2) “Well if you an Alton ga be friends wit dat yella boy you can’t be friends wit us!” (ALMA) “I ain’t care! I don’t wanna be friends which y’all anyway.”

EUGENE: In the schoolyard, when Alton and I would play we’d run around the yard and as we ran, we’d extend our arms to the side. It was synchronicity Both of us running with arms extended. Two boys. Not a light-skinned boy and a dark-skinned boy–TWO BOYS–running. Running despite summer heat. Summer heat can’t stop us/summer heat won’t stop us. Once while running Alton asked (ALTON) “Hey Gene, you think anybody ever ran around the whole wide world?” (EUGENE) “No I don’t think so.” (ALTON) “Let’s you an me do it Gene. When we git to be older–let’s us run around the whole world.”

ALMA: There were days when I ran with those guys. I just ran and ran. I didn’t know I could run. My mother Odelia–I never called her “Mom,” “Mother,” or “Mama”–just Odelia–she always made fun of me. (ODELIA) “Ole big fat funny lookin’ thing can’t run–old fat funny lookin’ thing can’t do nuttin’.” But I could run. I really began to run. (Beat) One day after school the three of us were playing our “running game.” Gene yells–

EUGENE: “Okay, we’re going through the jungle. There are vultures on both sides and the sky is filled with crows and you know what that means! That means somebody is gonna die so we gotta run–RUN FAST. We can’t let the vultures get us!”

ALMA: Alton and Eugene are running real fast and I’m having a hard time catching up. Then Gene turns around and yells–

EUGENE: “You can do it Alma–you run real well–don’t let the vultures get you. You can do it–come on Alma.”

ALMA: He stops for a second and takes me by the hand.

EUGENE: (Stops and takes her hand) “Come on Alma!”

ALMA: We run together. We run through the jungle. We survive the jungle. We finish running and the three of us fall to the ground–

EUGENE: “I told you! I told you you could do it! You did it!”

ALMA: We’re lying on the grass, Alton, Eugene, and I, and I say “Let’s sing the Monkees song!” (She sings) “Hey, hey, we’re the Monkees…”

EUGENE: (Joining in) “People say we monkey around/but we’re too busy singing/to put anybody down …”

EUGENE: There was a boy in school named Wyce who was light–if not a little lighter than me. (WYCE) “Why you hanging out with those darkassed Geechies for? Didn’t your momma tell you not to do that?” (EUGENE) “No, my daddy’s dark.” (WYCE) “Yeah that’s right. I forgot. Your momma shouldn’t have done that but at least you’re light like her.”

ALMA: Odelia began to get upset with me not coming straight home from school. (ODELIA) “Alma ya got to be mo ladylike. Stop rippin’ an rarin’ all over the place. Look at your hair all nappy from sweat. It don’t look nice for a girl to be runnin’–especially cause ya so big. Ya don’t look good runnin’–ya TOO BIG an lawd runnin’ in dis heat, ya don’t wanna git black.”

EUGENE: I ask Wyce, “So what I’m light. So what you’re light. Who cares? What does it matter?” He looks at me like I’m crazy. (WYCE) “What does it matter? Boy you wanna look like a spook an talk like some blackass Geechie?”

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