Act I

The show opens in a club, where Anton, a college-age Black man, performs a spoken-word poem telling his story. When he was nine, his mother, Juanita, left him locked in their home for a week while she went out to get drugs. Trapped in the intense heat without food, Young Anton broke free to survive. ( THE CREATION OF ANTON COLEMAN )

After Juanita is arrested, Anton is fostered by David and Dee Coleman, a wealthy white couple. David immediately feels a connection with Young Anton and helps him write his mother a letter. ( WAITING FOR YOU )

Dee is still mourning the death of their son in a car wreck and doesn’t feel ready to open her home or heart to another child. ( JAMES )

Out of loyalty to his mother, Young Anton resists bonding with David for months, until one night when David helps him push past his fear and learn to ski. ( COLEMAN BOYS )

Afraid of losing another son, David manipulates Juanita into giving up parental rights, so he can adopt Anton. ( IF YOU LOVE HIM )

Anton, devastated by his mother’s decision, tries to find her in their old neighborhood, but finds he no longer belongs there. When David picks him up, he agrees to let the Colemans adopt him and calls David “dad” for the first time. ( YOUNG ANTON’S CHOICE )

Years later, Anton has followed in David’s footsteps and he and his best friend, Brad, are now Harvard undergraduates. He meets Carine, a brilliant and revolutionary Black poet, and the two start dating. ( CARINE’S POEM )

Between his parents’ disapproval of her and David’s near-fatal heart attack, Anton breaks up with Carine and refocuses on his political career. He graduates from law school, and serves in the state legislature and as attorney general before finally running for his father’s former office as governor, at age 35. ( THE CREATION OF ANTON COLEMAN – REPRISE )

While remembering David’s father on the one-year anniversary of his death, Dee worries that Anton is unhappy, while David pushes him to focus on the governor’s race. ( COLEMAN BOYS – REPRISE )

One night, while responding to voters’ letters following a national magazine profile, Anton discovers a letter from Juanita, his birth mother. In it, she says he was smart to pick the Colemans over her, and that single statement upends Anton’s entire life story. ( BABY BOY )

Act II

Act II opens with Anton afraid that his birth mother is lying in order to blackmail him. He plans a rushed trip to Georgia to confront her, despite Brad desperately trying to stop him. ( CRISIS MODE )

Anton reunites with his birth mother, Juanita, and they come to realize that David manipulated them both, kept their letters from one another, and raised Anton with a false story of his life. David admits it by phone, but he refuses to apologize. ( SORRY )

Anton reconnects with Carine, his college girlfriend, who helps him process everything that’s happened. Feeling at peace for the first time in years, Carine’s life of quiet domesticity makes him rethink everything about who and what he wants to be. ( HOW LIVING FEELS )

Anton also bonds with Carine’s son, as he contemplates the family life he might have had. ( BABY BOY – REPRISE )

Anton realizes he has to return to the campaign trail and, while arguing with David by phone in the car, he gets pulled over by a racist cop. The traffic stop turns dangerous and, while Anton is handcuffed and thrown to the ground, David frantically reaches out to the Georgia governor to try to save him. While Anton’s life hangs in the balance, the three women in Anton’s life – Juanita, Dee, and Carine – celebrate him reconnecting with his birth mom. ( WHEN YOU BROUGHT HIM HOME )

Thanks to David’s frantic efforts, the cop lets Anton go. Anton is left deeply shaken, but alive. Just back from Georgia, Anton begins to give a campaign speech and finds he can't go through with it. He instead talks about his own history and the history of the US, as many people from his past appear in his mind and join in. ( MAYBE )