Be Bold. Speak Out. "King Hedley II"

Curt Bright Author

01/28/2021 Added

33 Plays

Description

Performance Major Nadia Williams reads an excerpt from "King Hedley II" by August Wilson.

Searchable Transcript

Search:

[00:00:00.374](emotional piano music)
[00:00:12.800]I ain't raising no kid to have somebody shoot him.
[00:00:17.130]To have his friend, shoot him.
[00:00:18.900]To have the police, shoot him.
[00:00:20.510]Why I want to bring another life into this world
[00:00:22.460]that don't respect life?
[00:00:24.788](scoffs)
[00:00:26.520]I don't want to raise no more babies
[00:00:28.670]when you got to fight to keep 'em alive.
[00:00:33.936]Take little buddy Will's mother up on Bryn Mawr road.
[00:00:38.089]What she got?
[00:00:40.400]A whole lot of heartache that ain't gonna never go away.
[00:00:43.130]She sitting up there in her living room right now,
[00:00:45.670]just sitting there.
[00:00:47.030]She can't stand.
[00:00:49.190]She's sitting there trying to figure out what happened.
[00:00:53.680]One minute her house is full of life.
[00:00:55.810]And the next it's full of death.
[00:00:57.130]She was waiting for him to come home
[00:00:58.580]and they brought her a corpse!
[00:01:02.360]Say "Come down and make the identification.
[00:01:06.050]Is this your son?"
[00:01:09.430]Got a tag on his toe that say John Doe.
[00:01:13.330]They got to put a number on it.
[00:01:14.670]John Doe, number four.
[00:01:18.520]She got dinner on the table.
[00:01:22.144]Say "Junior like fried chicken."
[00:01:26.080]She got some of that.
[00:01:27.830]Say "Junior like string beans."
[00:01:29.460]She got some of that too.
[00:01:30.300]She don't know that Junior ain't gonna be eating no more.
[00:01:35.932]You got a pile of clothes she got to wash up.
[00:01:39.300]Don't know that Junior don't need clothes no more.
[00:01:42.960]She look in the closet, Junior ain't got no suit.
[00:01:45.420]She got to go buy him a suit
[00:01:46.690]and he can't try it on, she got to guess the size.
[00:01:51.080]Somebody come up and tell her,
[00:01:52.127]"Oh Miss So-and-so, your boy got shot."
[00:01:56.560]She know it before they say it.
[00:02:00.340]Her knees start to get weak.
[00:02:02.446]She's shaking her head.
[00:02:03.500]She don't want to hear it.
[00:02:04.370]And somebody called the police.
[00:02:08.490]They come and they pick him up off the sidewalk
[00:02:11.530]dead nigger on Bryn Mawr Road.
[00:02:16.000]They got to quit playing cards to come pick him up.
[00:02:21.900]They used to take pictures.
[00:02:24.960]They don't even take pictures no more.
[00:02:27.900]They pull him out of the freezer and she look at him.
[00:02:31.610]She don't want to, but they make her look
[00:02:33.310]and what to do now?
[00:02:37.070]Only thing left to do was call the undertaker.
[00:02:39.840]Oh, but the line is busy.
[00:02:42.330]She got to call five times.
[00:02:44.160]The undertaker got so much business
[00:02:45.700]he don't know what to do.
[00:02:48.530]He losing sleep.
[00:02:50.620]He got to hire two more people to help him.
[00:02:53.020]On top of the other two he already got.
[00:02:57.050]He don't even know what the bodies look like no more.
[00:03:00.060]He couldn't tell you what they look like.
[00:03:02.240]He only remembered the problems we have with them.
[00:03:04.680]This one's all big and fat over here.
[00:03:06.610]If he fall off the table,
[00:03:07.480]it's gonna take six men to pick him up.
[00:03:10.930]And this one, that one ain't got no cheek.
[00:03:13.850]Oh, and this one's eyes won't stay closed.
[00:03:15.770]This one,
[00:03:18.080]This one been dead so long,
[00:03:19.230]he got maggots coming out of his nose.
[00:03:23.690]And this one right here,
[00:03:26.750]his mother won't go home.
[00:03:31.536]And the other-
[00:03:33.051]Hmm.
[00:03:35.930]I ain't going through that.
[00:03:39.350]I ain't having this baby,
[00:03:40.530]and I ain't got to explain it to nobody.

The screen size you are trying to search captions on is too small!

You can always jump over to MediaHub and check it out there.

Comments

0 Comments

Be Bold. Speak Out. "King Hedley II"

Description

Searchable Transcript

Comments icon comment

Related Channels

Comments