Fences is about how Troy raises his sons.  The first Lyons has been apart from him for many years and now turns up on payday, looking to borrow ten dollars.  Convinced that professional sport will let down for racist reasons Troy is adamantly opposed to Cory devoting too much time to American Football. In the very first scene Troy relates to his friend Bono how he asked his employer why none of the garbage truck drivers were black. 

Besides being disappointed by lack of employment chances, Troy creates a major disappointment for his wife whom he claims he loves when he takes up with another woman from Florida called Alberta.  There was a lively audience at the Lyric Hammersmith on Press Night expressing disapproval for Troy’s treatment of Rose.  As we look at the history of fathering in Troy’s family, he later discloses his own chequered history of going it alone at 14 after his mother has left when he was eight.

There is also Troy’s younger brother Gabriel (Simon Anthony-Rhoden) wounded in World War Two and now with a metal plate in his head.  It was compensation from the government for Gabe’s war wound that paid for the deposit in the house Rose and Troy live in now. Some of the debate is about where Gabe needs to live and the care that he needs with his disability.