Previous
Act 1
Themes
and Colors
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in Clybourne Park, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Race and Racism
Neighborhoods and Ownership
Communication and Miscommunication
Men, Women, and Gender Roles
Disability and Inclusion
Summary
Analysis
This second act opens in September of 2009. It’s a Saturday afternoon. The set is still the interior of the house from Act I, but it is rundown and shabby, much of the floor linoleum, plaster crumbling from the walls. In the center of the living room, six people sit in a circle: a white couple named Steve and Lindsey, and their lawyer, Kathy, and a black couple named Kevin and Lena, and their lawyer, Tom.
Unlike in Act 1, where the house was full of moving boxes but still well taken care of, now it is run-down. It suggests a more general dilapidation of the neighborhood as a whole, and helps suggest the lower economic status of Clybourne Park in the 2000s compared to the 1950s—and why Steve and Lindsey would want to renovate.
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The group begins discussing a document of neighborhood guidelines for renovation. Steve and Lindsey have recently purchased the house, and want to make renovations. Specifically, they want to make it much taller than it already is. They have decided to meet with Kevin and Lena to discuss restrictions the neighborhood association has proposed on making changes to the area’s historic homes.
Lindsey and Steve at first seem amenable to conversations about the size of their house. They want to be courteous neighbors, or at least appear to be courteous and open to suggestions. Lindsey and Steve go into the meeting seeing it as a problem related only to their house, whereas Kevin and Lena are worried about the neighborhood as a whole, and how a single house can affect a community. That Kevin and Lena are concerned with preserving the history of the neighborhood puts them, ironically, on equal footing with Karl from Act 1, who also wanted to preserve his neighborhood, albeit for different reasons.
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The group begins by addressing terminology, discussing what a frontage is, and how the way frontage is defined will affect the renovations Steve and Lindsey want to make to the house. Kevin wonders if the language matters, but Steve says he doesn’t want to overlook a definition and get “screwed because of the language.”
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Kathy stands up to take a phone call from Hector, the architect, and Lindsey and Steve briefly argue about whether the perimeter of the house can be changed. Lindsey and Steve turn back to the rest of the group and apologize. They talk about the architect, who is upset that his plans might be rejected. While Kathy talks on the phone, Lindsey tells Kevin and Lena how much she loves the neighborhood, especially the location, which will radically reduce her commute. Kevin and Lindsey realize they work across the street from each other, and Steve and Kevin realize they have a friend in common, Kyle Hendrickson.
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Kathy passes the phone to Lindsey, who wants to talk to Hector. Steve makes a comment about Spaniards, like the architect, and how they are temperamental. Kevin agrees, but Tom says Hector seemed “cool”.
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The group discusses trips their families have taken across Europe and Northern Africa—Morocco, Spain, Prague, and Switzerland. Kevin and Kathy do most of the talking. Eventually Lena tries to make an announcement, but Steve cuts her off, wanting to wait for Lindsey. There’s a pause in the conversation, and then Tom suggests returning to the document while they wait. Steve immediately derails the conversation by pointing out that earlier Kathy had claimed Marrakech as the capital of Morocco, but in fact it is Rabat. Tom tries to get the conversation back on track, but Steve and Kathy continue to argue.
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Lindsey returns. She explains Hector was upset that he wasn’t included in the meeting. Steve asks Lindsey what the capital of Morocco is, and he, Kathy, and Lindsey continue to discuss geography. Steve has the most extensive knowledge of geography and national capitals, and is offended when Lindsey confuses Bali and Mali, as they are “distinct countries.”
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Lena tries again to make her announcement, but is again interrupted when Kathy asks to be reminded of Lena’s name, prompting everyone to reintroduce themselves. Before Lena can speak again, Dan, a contractor working in the backyard, enters from the kitchen. He’s digging a trench and announces there’s been an issue, and Steve gets up and goes outside with him to deal with it.
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Tom briefly gets the conversation back on track. He explains that the neighborhood has tried to put together a set of guidelines for future renovations. Essentially, measurements are based on the average house in Clybourne Park, so that renovating a house to make it taller than average would require the volume of the house to be reduced in other places. Kathy becomes immediately defensive, and argues that there’s too much variation in existing house sizes to extrapolate into guidelines for future renovation.
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Lindsey explains that she thinks “these houses are so charming,” but the house was so run-down she would rather build a new one. Tom explains that Kevin and Lena called him when they realized Lindsey and Steve planned to build a house fifteen feet taller than the surrounding buildings. By pushing back, he, Lena, and Kevin are just trying to maintain the “integrity—the architectural integrity” of a “historically significant” neighborhood.
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Tom’s phone rings and he leaves the conversation to answer the call. Steve returns from the backyard, and explains the diggers hit something as they started working on a filtration system for a koi pond. Lena suggests everyone turn off his or her phone. Steve suggests getting back to business, but Kevin doesn’t want to start without his lawyer. Instead, they discuss Lindsey’s pregnancy and Kevin and Lena’s three children.
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Steve and Kevin laugh about how they both know Kyle Hendrickson. Kyle told Steve a joke, which he wants to tell, but which Lindsey thinks is inappropriate. Lena interrupts again, more aggressively. Kathy, who has been checking her voicemails, and Tom, who was still on the phone, hang up and focus on her. She is frustrated that she’s had to wait for a turn to speak, and that nothing is getting done. Tom apologizes for being on the phone, and Lindsey apologizes for making so much small talk. Kevin tries to tell Lindsey she’s just being friendly. Lena, offended, says “I’m being friendly,” and points out it would be friendly “for us to respect each other’s time.”
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Now that the room is finally silent, Lena can say what she’s been meaning to say. She explains that she grew up in Clybourne Park, and as a result is concerned with “a particular period in history and the things that people experienced here in this community during that period,” and says that she’s referring to people who faced obstacles but made a life. Because of this communal history that also, for Lena, is family history, she wants to make sure the neighborhood is respected.
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Steve immediately asks if when Lena discusses the value of the neighborhood she means historical or monetary. Lena clarifies that she means historical. Tom points out that if Steve read the neighborhood petition he should understand.
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Lindsey, trying to be diplomatic, explains she isn’t trying to change the neighborhood. In fact, she reveals, she was resistant to move in because of “the way it used to be.”
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Lena asks Lindsey to clarify, but before she can answer Steve and Kathy begin to talk about how the neighborhood was originally German and Irish. Steve brings up an article he read about changing demographics and neighborhood decline. Kathy describes it as “trouble,” but Kevin responds that drugs and violence are trouble, but that a neighborhood cannot be trouble inherently. He then jokes that he and Lena were crackheads, which offends Lindsey.
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Lindsey, trying to maintain some kind of moral high ground, then explains how horrible she thinks policies that disenfranchise black neighborhoods can be. She goes on to discuss housing projects and their deleterious effects on children. Steve agrees that creating an “artificial semblance of a community” is creating a ghetto, a word Lindsey rejects, and which spins off into a conversation about Jewish ghettos in Prague, and then to Lena and Kevin’s trip to Prague and Switzerland. Kevin wonders if Steve skis, which makes Lindsey laugh. Steve is slightly offended that she finds the idea of him skiing so funny.
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Lindsey tries to turn the conversation back to the document, but they immediately get off track. Lena apologizes for taking up time, and explains she wasn’t trying to “romanticize” poverty, she just has a personal connection to the house, as she grew up in the neighborhood and her great aunt lived in the house they are sitting in currently. Together she and Kevin explain her aunt worked hard for the house, and that during Lena’s childhood the neighborhood was predominantly black, with the exception of Mr. Wheeler at the grocery store. Steve and Lindsey are shocked at this revelation.
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Lena wonders if the house was affordable for her aunt because of the suicide of the son of the previous owners. Lindsey is offended on behalf of Lena’s family, but also horrified that she was not notified of the house’s history when she purchased it. Lindsey becomes increasingly agitated, and she goes to compose herself in the corner of the room. Steve follows, and although they are talking quietly, the audience can hear as Lindsey argues there should be a law demanding that sellers disclose the history of the home.
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Dan interrupts again, emerging from the backyard through the kitchen, carrying the footlocker from Act I, now covered in mold and dirt. He jokes about it being buried treasure, but leaves when it becomes clear he is interrupting a tense moment.
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Lindsey apologizes for losing her composure. She explains that the combined stress of the baby, the money, and receiving the neighborhood petition has sent her over the edge. Returning to the document, Tom suggests reducing the height of the house, but Kathy snaps that it’s too late to redesign the house. She reminds Lindsey and Steve that they are not under a legal obligation to change the designs.
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Tom disagrees with Kathy, and reminds her that the City Council has recognized the “historic status” of the neighborhood and its “distinctive collection of low-rise single family homes intended to house a community of working-class families.”
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Lindsey argues that neighborhoods change with time, but Lena asks her to consider who is responsible for changing the neighborhood now, and what the political interests being served are. Lindsey misses the point, complaining that they are discussing single house, but Lena points out “it happens one house at a time.”
Steve interjects that Lena should just come out and say what she’s trying to say instead of “doing this elaborate little dance around it.” He thinks her argument is informed by “the issue of…racism.” Lena and Kevin, feeling that Lena has been called a racist when their issue was the “inappropriately large house” Steve and Lindsey intended to construct, become angry, even when Steve points out his said the word racism, not that Lena herself was a racist.
Lindsey attempts to distance herself from Steve as he continues to insist race was clearly a factor in the various issues Lena brought to the table. He mocks the “secret conspiracy” Lena has brought up, which she insists is real. Lindsey, apologizing for Steve, insists “half of my friends are black!” which Steve takes issue with, forcing her to name all her black friends.
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Tom tries to get the group back on task, but they’re too far gone. Steve believes “the history of America is the history of private property,” humans are naturally territorial, and individual “tribes” don’t like it when their territory is stolen. When Lena points out that her ancestors were literally private property, Steve offers a grand, insincere apology on behalf of white Americans.
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Steve feels like his free speech is being stifled. And complains that “you guys” can say the “n—word” but he can’t even tell one joke. Kevin and Lena insist he tell it if he wants to so badly, though Lindsey continues to protest that it offends her because “it’s disgusting and juvenile and traffics in the worst possible of obsolete bullshit stereotypes.” Steve finally tells the joke, in which a white man goes to jail and has a black cellmate. The cellmate asks if he wants to be mommy or daddy. The white man says he wants to be daddy, and the black man responds, “Okay, well then bend over ‘cause Mommy’s gonna fuck you in the ass.”
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Lena says she’s not offended, but she finds the joke unfunny, while Lindsey continues to argue that it is offensive. Steve feels that Lindsey is not allowed to be offended, as it doesn’t concern her. Tom interjects that he’s gay, and therefore the joke offends him. Steve tries to argue the joke isn’t about sex, it’s about rape, and Kathy adds that her sister was raped, and therefore she’s offended.
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The conversation continues to devolve. Kevin tells a joke about white men, and Steve responds with a joke about black men. Neither man is offended by the other’s joke, but Lindsey says that Steve can’t be offended, as he’s never been “politically marginalized” as a result of uninformed stereotypes like the ones these jokes traffic in.
Lena ends the conversation when she offers her own joke—how are white women like tampons. Kevin encourages her not to tell it, but she does—white women are like tampons “because they’re both stuck up cunts.” Lindsey and Kathy are both offended at the “hostile joke.” Kathy says she feels that she is intelligent, not stuck up. Steve, frustrated, points out that in their earlier conversation Kathy didn’t even know the capital of Morocco.
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Kathy begins to pack up to leave. Steve shares that one of the things that really offends him is “white suburban assholes still driving around with the yellow ribbon magnets on their SUVs in support of some bullshit war.” Kevin reveals he has three ribbons on his car, one for each of his family remembers in the military. He asks Steve if that makes him an asshole.
Tom wraps up the conversation. No one has final thoughts except for Lindsey, who is hurt because she feels her “ethics” have been “called into question.” Lena says she isn’t questioning Lindsey’s ethics, but instead her taste. Tom and Kathy leave, making plans to talk about the house early next week. Lindsey, genuinely offended, asks Lena repeatedly what is wrong with her taste.
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Kevin ushers Lena out, and tells Steve and Lindsey they should just communicate through lawyers from now on. Steve remarks to Lindsey, quietly, that Lena is a cunt, which Kevin hears. He barges back in and threatens to slap Steve. Lena urges him to let it go, Lindsey explains they’ve been under a lot of pressure, and Steve refuses to take any responsibility for what he said, saying “I didn’t do anything to you or her” and asking “why can’t you chill?”
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Dan has entered from the backyard with bolt cutters for the footlocker, and now comes forward to try and break up the fight, putting his hand on Kevin’s shoulder. Angry, Kevin says “don’t you touch me,” and Dan backs off. Lena and Kevin turn to each other, as do Lindsey and Steve. The two couples engage in simultaneous arguments. Lena complains that Kevin is “trying to make friends with everybody,” while he complains that she’s been unnecessarily confrontational. Lena and Kevin exit as they continue to argue.
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Meanwhile, Steve tells Lindsey that he thinks the planned house is too big, and Lindsey tells Steve he doesn’t have to move in if he doesn’t want to, but she plans on living in the house they’ve purchased. At this point Kevin and Lena have left, and Steve and Lindsey begin to gather their things and fold the chairs they had been sitting on. Steve complains that Lindsey is always privileging the baby’s needs over his, and reveals that before she got pregnant Lindsey had given him an ultimatum: have a baby with her or get a divorce. They leave, still arguing.
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As Lindsey and Steve were cleaning up, Dan opened the footlocker with his bolt cutters. Kenneth descends the staircase, dressed in a military uniform and carrying a transistor radio. He is invisible to Dan in the present day. He sits by a window and begins to draft his suicide note. From inside the trunk, Dan removes an envelope containing the same note Kenneth is writing by the window, and begins to read it aloud. It begins, “Dear Mom and Dad, I know you’ll probably blame yourselves for what I’ve done…”
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Bev comes downstairs to see Kenneth. She wonders why he’s dressed up and he lies that it is for a job interview. Francine comes in through the front door, greets Bev and Kenneth, and disappears down the hallway. Bev goes back upstairs, but before she does she announces, “I really believe things are about to change for the better.” After she exits, Kenneth continues to write, Dan continues to read, and the lights fade to black.
