“You Look Like the Real You.”
An Exploration of African American Performative Masculinity in Joe Turner’s Come
and Gone and Topdog/Underdog
"For many blacks, life is a relentless performance for the mainstream audience and often
for each other. […] Even when he is offstage, a black male may feel that he is onstage."
(Majors and Billson, Cool Pose: The Dilemmas of Black Manhood in America)
Introduction:
In contemporary American drama the impact of the “black experience” on the
standards of African American performativity, or the manner in which people portray
their identities in their daily lives, is predominantly exposed through male characters. In
American society, one sees this performativity through the everyday “performances” that
black men execute so as to live up to the specific archetypes that have been created for
them over the centuries through familial structure, language, clothing, music, religious
practices, art and occupational trends. Theatrically, the works of playwrights August
Wilson and Suzan Lori-Parks perpetuate the notion of “masculine identity as a function
of cultural mythology” which has been crafted to propagate stereotypes both within the
African American community and towards white society (Chaudhuri, 290). Both
playwrights centrally focus on the African American male quest for identity within
American society, leaving women only to fill the roles of wife, child, and whore. In both
plays, "the man's performance is what makes or breaks the black culture's image of itself"
(McDonough 143). Throughout Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Topdog/Underdog,
playwrights August Wilson and Suzan Lori-Parks’ examinations of masculine
performativity in the past and present incarnations of the African American community,
through the exploration of the influence of time period, clothing, language, and
occupational worth, have individually crafted a blueprint for the possible cultural
identities of the “black man.”
The Times We Live In:
The importance of the time period of the world of the play is vital when discussing
the nature of African American performative masculinity in the American theatre. Time
period serves as a function that greatly impacts every detail from the sweeping ideology
of general public to personal clothing choice. Comparatively, Joe Turner’s Come and
Gone and Topdog/Underdog are set in drastically different periods of time. Joe Turner’s
Come and Gone explores characters, with close proximity and ties to African American
slavery, found in Pittsburgh in the summer of 1911. Topdog/Underdog, in contrast,
exposes the world of contemporary urban black men who have been entirely removed
from any first hand accounts of slavery or Jim Crow segregation. In her article,
“’Tomorrow Never Comes’: Songs of Cultural Identity in August Wilson's ‘Joe Turner's
Come and Gone,’” Mary Bogumil suggests:
With the massive migration came feelings of displacement for many of
those who were former slaves and for the sons and daughters of those
slaves. These feelings were symptomatic reactions to their new social
climate. While the African Americans were now free men and women in
the North, their freedom unfortunately often took the form of a selfimposed isolation, perhaps a vestige of their marginalization as a culture in
the antebellum South. (Bogumil 464)
Though the plays take place in very different periods of time, this “self-imposed
isolation” plays an essential role in the manner of dress, speech patterns, and ideas of
familial structure utilized by the central characters in both Joe Turner’s Come and Gone
and Topdog/Underdog. It is the ways that the characters respond to their self-imposed
isolation, through their performativity, that expose how time period influences action.
The Clothes We Wear:
In his article, “The Social Skin,” Terence Turner says of dress and bodily
adornment that it is, “perhaps the [medium] most specialized in the shaping and
communication of personal and societal identity” (Turner 114). Throughout both Joe
Turner’s Come and Gone and Topdog/Underdog, clothing and physical appearance play
an important role in the way that male characters perform their chosen version of
masculinity. Though time period clearly distinguishes the attire worn, the importance of
costuming, both literal and figurative, as well as the manner in which clothing is obtained
and discarded, visually dictates a man’s character and social identity.
In Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, the transformation of Herald Loomis from
‘songless’ slave to empowered free black man is represented through his choice of attire.
When Herald Loomis, a man who “seeks to recreate the world into one that contains his
image,” first appears, Wilson describes Loomis as wearing a menacing “hat and a long
wool coat” (Wilson 14). Initially, his presence is described as “wild eyed” and “mean
looking” (Wilson 60, 40). Loomis’ clothing choices, which appear very threatening to all
of the characters aside from his daughter and Bynum, represent his attempt to create a
self-imposed isolation from members of both mainstream and African American society
who are connected to their own truest versions of self. However, as the play progresses,
Loomis finds his “song” through spiritual connection during the Juba and in freeing
himself from his wife. In the final moments of the play, as Loomis is “resurrected,
cleansed and given breath, free from any encumbrance other than the workings of his
own heart and the bonds of the flesh” he is standing shirtless with a self imposed knife
slash across the chest (Wilson 93). In order to be the “shining man” that Bynum sees,
Loomis must be unclothed and exposed beneath the skin in order to return to the most
basic level of humanity. For Loomis, the clothing of the white man, the wool coat and
hat, has forced him to hold on to his shackles of slavery. In his performance of African
traditional religious blood ritual, and the removal of the clothing imposed on him by
European men, Loomis finds, and begins to perform a new kind of black identity: one of
a free man.
Throughout Topdog/Underdog, the two central characters, Lincoln and Booth,
allow clothing to define their worth and identity within their community, between
themselves, and even at an individual level. Lori-Parks displays this definition
prominently in the scene where the brothers discuss Lincoln’s work uniform - an
Abraham Lincoln costume - as they try on brand new suits that Booth has stolen for
them. Lincoln talks about his costume stating, “It don’t make me. Worn suit coat, not
even worn by the fool that I’m supposed to be playing. […] Fake beard. Top hat. Don’t
make me into no Lincoln. I was Lincoln on my own before any of that” (Lori-Parks 34).
Lincoln, who is paid less because he must use white face in order to appear Caucasian, is
secure in the idea that his work costume does not define him or his worth. However,
when he presents himself to Booth in his new suit, Booth says, “You look sharp too, man.
You look like the real you. Most of the time you walking around all bedraggled and shit.
You look good. Like you used to look back in thuh day when you had Cookie in love
with you and all the women in the world was eating out of yr hand” (Lori-Parks 34). The
juxtaposition of this situation is highly ironic. In order for Lincoln to have any place in
the business world, he must literally become a “white man.” Yet, when he is the most
“real” version of himself, his only worth, according to Booth, lies in his ability to perform
a character, the successful black man, for the women in their lives. This leaves the
audience to wonder if these characters have any true sense of self worth beyond physical
representation.
The Way We Speak, The Work We Do:
Throughout both Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Topdog/Underdog,
playwrights Wilson and Lori-Parks utilize rhetoric patterns, symbolic names, and specific
occupations as a means of representing the way that their characters perform masculinity.
Some characters actions are influenced by their name from birth while other characters
must learn to live up to the name they have been given. In either situation, the language
and etiquette surrounding the characters greatly influences the way that the men attempt
to acculturate, live up to the potential of their name, and flout their masculinity.
Bynum Walker, through his powerful, yet quietly subtle strength and masculinity,
performs the role of the ever-wandering African spiritual leader, “lost in a world of his
own making” (Wilson 4). Throughout Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, Wilson establishes
a separation between the role of Christianity and the African traditional religion, “defined
by belief in ancestors, belief in spirits, and the practice of magic and ritual” (Rudolph
563). He utilizes the character of Bynum as a confirmation of the strong sense of
separateness between the world of the African American and the European American.
Bynum, a conjure man known as “the Binding Man,” has the ability to spiritually bind
those who wish to be eternally bound together. Throughout the play, Bynum, whose
name is a portmanteau made of the words “bind” and “them,” lives according to the
purpose inscribed in his names: “’Bynum,’ the one who binds people together so that
they discover a sense of truth within themselves and ‘Walker,’ the one who wanders, a
seeker” (Bogumil 471).
As a man, Bynum fulfills the role of the “spiritual” man who is in touch with his
African roots. Bogumil suggests “most blacks of the post-Civil War generation walked
away from anything that recalled their servitude in the South, the racial etiquette of
deference and subordination. Many who traveled north were restless, dissatisfied,
unwilling to mask their true selves and accommodate to traditional roles" (Bogumil 467).
Unlike some who have either chosen to or have accidentally forgotten their African ways,
Bynum, one who is “unwilling to mask” his true self, speaks with an unashamed
elegance, and intelligence, that allows him to publically perform his masculinity, without
seeming haughty, in a staggeringly different manner than any of the other characters
explored in either Joe Turner’s Come and Gone or Topdog/Underdog.
Herald Loomis, an aptly named character, performs his destined masculine
identity through his transformation from a lost and “looming” man to a “herald, the shiny
man, the one who knows all that came before” (Bogumil 473). Loomis who is lost in his
own skewed version of reality, performs many different jobs: church deacon, farm hand,
slave, and, perhaps least important (in his mind), father. However, many assume that he
might perhaps be a convict, gambler, or murderer. The ambiguity of his true self, as
defined by occupation, is representative of his own internal struggle with identity. It is
not until he removes all of these potential identities, by leaving his daughter and wife,
that he can begin the process of internally defining himself through future social actions.
In her article, "Framing African American Cultural Identity: The Bookends Plays in
August Wilson’s 10-Play Cycle,” Sandra Shannon suggests, “Loomis's success at finding
his starting place and finding his song is far more important than reuniting with his wife
and resuming their marriage. What is more important, however, is that Loomis himself is
once again intact as he leaves the set in pursuit of another young woman who has sparked
his interest” (Shannon 32). Wilson himself explains, "We have been told so many times
how irresponsible we are as black males that I try and present positive images of
responsibility" (Qtd. in McDonough 143). Ironically, one could argue that Wilson, by
allowing Loomis to leave all of his familial responsibility in the pursuit of selfsatisfaction, is in fact promoting irresponsible action as a positive image of African
American masculinity.
Wilson also uses language to reinforce Loomis’ transformation. Loomis, whose
base language is juxtaposed with Bynum’s poetics, begins the play frustrated with his
metaphorical inability to stand up, crying, “My legs won’t stand up! My legs won’t stand
up!” (Wilson 56) By the end of the play he chants the revelation, “I’m standing! I’m
standing. My legs stood up! I’m standing now!” (Wilson 93). Loomis’ preacher-esque
language becomes representative of the new found freedom of his poetic soul. As Loomis
begins to speak with a quality similar to Bynum’s, Wilson implies that a connection with
traditional African ways can resurrect ones free soul.
Throughout Topdog/Underdog, Booth and Lincoln’s struggle to operate in a
world of economic crisis, leads them to perform their masculinity through aggressive
hyper-sexualized language, theft, and both figurative and literal imitation of their
historical namesakes. Booth, whose girlfriend has left him and who is financially
dependent on Lincoln, performs his version of masculinity by utilizing the language of a
three-card Monte hustler, theft, and his blatantly overt hypersexualization of women.
Lincoln, a divorced ex-hustler, attempts to pull himself out of his post gambling induced
poverty by working an “honest” job impersonating Abraham Lincoln in whiteface.
Lincoln performs his subdued version of masculinity by working a job he hates,
providing for his brother, and silently drinking away his problems.
In her review of Topdog/Underdog, Una Chaundri suggests:
Parks' brothers are shaped by a radically racialized history. That history is
both personal (their shared memories of childhood and parental
abandonment) and public -- the two merging in the image of the older
brother’s unlikely occupation. That occupation was contrasted with two
others-- the older brother’s former one as a Three-Card Monte-playing
street hustler and that of the younger brother’s virtually supernatural skill
as a shoplifter. As the brothers discuss, describe, argue over, evaluate, and
rehearse these professions, they amplify a contrast, thematized in the play,
between two ways of performing identity. (Chaudhuri 291)
That amplified contrast leads Booth to resort to violence when he realizes that Lincoln
will always out perform his hustling abilities and his ideal masculinity. In this one
murderous action, Booth and Lincoln live up to the destiny of the names that were
jokingly bestowed upon them by their neglectful father. Though the boys, abandoned by
their parents, were forced become their own family and take care of each other, Booth in
the end must destroy the only family he has in order to restore himself. Much like
Loomis, Booth must remove any sense of family, in his case through murder, in order to
be the free black man that he longs to be. However, one would argue that his freedom
comes with the high and punishing cost of criminality and isolated struggle. Lori-Parks,
somewhat counterintuitively, neither condones nor glorifies Booth’s violent act of
machismo. This is an interesting theatrical choice, considering American culture has
created a cultural ideology that has a tendency to specifically punish minority groups for
their performance of this encouraged vision of masculinity.
Conclusion:
In "The Money Shot: Economies of Sex, Guns, and Language in
Topdog/Underdog," Suzan-Lori Parks discusses the difficulty of writing plays about
African American people without essentializing or appealing to the ‘‘Black Aesthetic.’’
Theatre, she says, is important for African American people because it ‘‘can ‘tell it like it
is’; ‘tell it as it was’; and ‘tell it as it could be’’ (Tucker-Abramson, 77). Similarly,
August Wilson has said that he writes plays in order "to understand where and who I am,
and to move with that understanding" as well as to “give African Americans an image of
themselves that might help lead them to a greater self awareness” (Quoted in
McDonough, 143). Both playwrights have crafted brilliant works that utilize the stories,
sounds, characteristics, and potential of many archetypal African American men.
Throughout both Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Topdog/Underdog, Wilson and LoriParks’ have written characters that perform their definition of masculinity, through
sexuality, aggression, religion, business, family, clothing, and their use of language, both
for their audience of fellow players, as well as for the theatrical audience. In their
examinations of masculine performativity, Wilson and Lori-Parks’ achieve their goal of
highlighting the possible past and current cultural identities of the “black man.” Their
plays encourage audiences to question the performances being portrayed in front of them
and create a new future where masculinity need no longer be defined by how one
“performs” themself for others.
Works Cited
Bogumil, Mary C. ““Tomorrow Never Comes”: Songs of Cultural Identity in August
Wilson's “Joe Turner's Come and Gone”” Theatre Journal 46.4 (1994): 463-76.
JSTOR. Web. 15 Apr. 2012.
Chaundri, Una. "Topdog/Underdog (review)." Theatre Journal 54.2 (2002): 28991.Project MUSE. Web. 15 Apr. 2012.
McDonough, Carla J. Staging Masculinity: Male Identity in Contemporary American
Drama. Jefferson, NC: McFarland &, 1997. Print.
Parks, Suzan-Lori. Topdog/Underdog. New York: Theatre Communications Group,
2001. Print.
Rudolph, Amanda M. "Images of African Traditional Religions and Christianity in Joe
Turner's Come and Gone and The Piano Lesson." Journal of Black Studies 33.5
(2003): 562-75. JSTOR. Web. 15 Apr. 2012.
Shannon, Sandra D. "Framing African American Cultural Identity: The Bookends Plays
in August Wilson’s 10-Play Cycle." College Literature 36.2 (2009): 2639.Project MUSE. Web. 15 Apr. 2012.
Tucker-Abramson, Myka. "The Money Shot: Economies of Sex, Guns, and Language in
Topdog/Underdog." Modern Drama 50.1 (2007): 77-97. Project MUSE. Web. 15
Apr. 2012.
Turner, T. “The Social Skin.” Not Work Alone, ed. J. Cherfas and R. Lewin, London:
Temple Smith. 1980. Print.
Wilson, August. Joe Turner's Come and Gone: A Play in Two Acts. New York: New
American Library, 1988. Print.