Two Trains Running by August Wilson

The seventh play is August Wilson’s American Century Cycle, Two Trains Running takes place in a restaurant run by a man named Memphis Lee. It is the 1960s, and the neighborhood is about to go through major economic development and gentrification. While we see a lot of the same themes as in August’s earlier works (surrounding race, oppression, identity), we see how those themes are filtered through a more modern world that is in the midst of the Civil Rights Movement. Malcolm X has just been killed, and the younger characters in the play, namely Sterling and Risa, are searching for who they are and where they fit in. Memphis has given up on trying to save his business from being taken by the government, but insists on getting the money he deserves.