After being kidnapped from New York and sold into slavery, Solomon Northup uses his skills and carefully placed trust to survive and seek a way back to his family.
- Scenes 1–29
Solomon lives freely in Saratoga as a husband, father, worker, and musician.
- Scenes 30–65
Kidnapped and held under the imposed name Platt, Solomon must preserve his life and identity.
- Scenes 66–123
He enters plantation life under Ford, passes through Tibeats’s violence and the near-lynching, and is transferred to Epps.
- Scene 124
Solomon is transferred to Epps’s plantation and placed among Patsey and the enslaved workers, opening the harsher final plantation phase.
- Just before
- Scene 142
Epps wakes the enslaved workers at night and silently singles Patsey out; Phebe begins to cry at what she knows is coming.
- Scene 143
Epps drags Patsey into the field, assaults her, then beats and whips her when she refuses to respond.
- Scene 144
Mistress Epps gives Solomon another shopping list as he returns from the cotton field.
- Scene 145
This scene
