30 PLAYS IN 30 DAYS: BONUS PLAY "Come Down Burning" by Kia Corthron

 

Today, I have another bonus play. I read a full-length, and, tonight, read a brilliant one act play called Come Down Burning by Kia Corthron. It is in a collection called The Best American Short Plays 1993-1994, which was given to me by my high school drama coach and dear friend, Tom Lyford. 

Kia Corthron has written many plays, as well as the novel The Castle Cross the Magnet Carter which won the 2016 Center For Fiction First Novel Prize. She also wrote episodes for the television series The Jury and The Wire. 

Come Down Burning centers around two grown sisters: Skoolie, the elder sister, who is paralyzed from her waist down due to a fall from tree as a child, and Tee, the younger sister with three children, who always needs help from Skoolie. It is established that Skoolie is the strong one, despite her physical condition, and she can move around fiercely in a wooden cart her father had made for her years ago, a cart with wheels on the bottom. Already, Corthron has inverted a cliche in a terrific manner by making Skoolie the one who takes care of the family. Tee has moved in with her three children, ages 9, 6 and a baby of just 3 months, and we learn it is not the first time that Skoolie has had to take Tee in and take care of her. Tee defers to Skoolie on most things, like how best to feed the baby, and how to deal with a mean teacher who is singling out her daughter, but this begins to build a kind of resentment--- in truth, a feeling that has probably been building in Tee for years

Skoolie makes money doing hair, and also performing illegal abortions on the side. Though Tee has three children is pregnant again, we learn two of her children had died, most likely because of malnourishment brought on by poverty. Class, race and poverty is dealt with in a strong manner in this play, though not in any way that feels preachy. Tee needs to make a decision about the pregnancy, and how to move forward, and if she can even move forward without her older sister's help. 

But even more than help, she wants Skoolie's approval. 

I will not go into the ending here, only to say that it was a very powerful piece and that Corthron packs a great deal of emotion into a a short piece. Her language is also poetic, yet still feels natural and real. 

Come Down Burning had a workshop production at the Long Wharf Theatre, and then premiered at the American Place Theater in 1993. To learn more about it, or to order a copy yourself, you can CLICK HERE.

Thanks for reading, and please feel free to comment if you have any thoughts about Kia Corthron's intense one act play, or with any recommendations for plays that I may not have read or discussed. If you would like to learn more about my published plays, please CLICK HERE.