Textbook

During the 1920s and 1930s, Willis Richardson (1889-1977) was highly respected as a leading African-American playwright and drama anthologist. His plays were performed by numerous black high school, college, and university drama groups and by theater companies in Chicago, New York, Washington D.C., Cleveland, Baltimore, and Atlanta. With the opening of The Chip Woman's Fortune (1923), he became the first African American to have a play produced on Broadway. Several of his 46 plays were published in assorted magazines, and in his essays, he urged black Americans to seek their dramatic material in their own lives and circumstances. In addition, he edited three anthologies of plays by African-Americans. But between 1940 and his death in 1977, Richardson came to realize that his plays were period pieces and that they no longer reflected the problems and situations of African-Americans. In the years before his death, he attempted vigorously yet unsuccessfully to preserve several of his plays through publication, if not production. But the man who has been called the father of African-American drama and who was considered the hope and promise of African-American drama died in obscurity. Richardson has even been neglected by the scholarly community. This critical biography, the first extensive consideration of his life and work, firmly reestablishes his pioneering role in American theater. The book begins with a detailed chronology, followed by a thoughtful biographical essay. The volume then examines the nature of African-American drama in the 1920s, the period during which Richardson was most productive, and it analyzes his approach to drama as a means of educating African-American audiences. It then explores the African-American community as the central theme in Richardson's plays, for Richardson typically looks at the consequences of refusals by blacks to help one another. The work additionally considers Richardson's history plays, his anthologies, his dramas intended for black children, and his essays. A concluding chapter summarizes his lasting influence; the book closes with a listing of his plays and an extensive bibliography.

The first critical volume to explore the contexts for and influences of female African American dramatists, including their exploration of black history and identity through diverse, courageous, and visionary dramas.

African American women have increasingly begun to see their plays performed from regional stages to Broadway. Yet many of these artists still struggle to gain attention. In this volume, Sandra Adell draws from the vital wellspring of works created by African American women in the twenty-first century to present ten plays by both prominent and up-and-coming writers. Taken together, the selections portray how these women engage with history as they delve into--and shake up--issues of gender and class to craft compelling stories of African American life. Gliding from gritty urbanism to rural landscapes, these works expand boundaries and boldly disrupt modes of theatrical representation. Selections: Blue Door , by Tanya Barfield; Levee James , by S. M. Shephard-Massat; Hoodoo Love , by Katori Hall; Carnaval , by Nikkole Salter; Single Black Female , by Lisa B. Thompson; Fabulation, or The Re-Education of Undine , by Lynn Nottage; BlackTop Sky , by Christina Anderson; Voyeurs de Venus , by Lydia Diamond; Fedra , by J. Nicole Brooks; and Uppa Creek: A Modern Anachronistic Parody in the Minstrel Tradition , by Keli Garrett.

A collection of plays by contemporary African-American writers.

This anthology of nine contemporary plays (all produced between 1975 and 1990) actively confronts the racial realities of American culture and celebrates the African American experience with originality and meaning. Playwrights include George C. Wolfe, Leslie Lee, Steve Carter, Amiri Baraka, P.J. Gibson, William Branch, Alexander Simmons, Ed Bullins, and August Wilson.