August Wilson's King Hedley II is the eighth of 10 projected works for a 20th-century cycle of plays. It takes place in a row of tenement backyards blotching Pittsburgh's Hill District. As designed by the ingenious David Gallo, the enclave features, upstage of these backyards, a row of attached tenement houses that look as if they've been chewed at by angry gods. The street, barely glimpsed beyond, has a gentle grade rising to the left--literally indicating the hill. This grade also symbolizes striving. Behind the tenement houses lie other decomposing buildings; beyond them we see an expanse of sky, symbolizing the universe.

As the play starts, a round, agitated man called Stool Pigeon[...]