The Emperor Jones is a 1920 play by American dramatist Eugene O'Neill that tells the tale of Brutus Jones, a resourceful, self-assured African American and a former Pullman porter, who kills another black man in a dice game, is jailed, and later escapes to a small, backward Caribbean island where he sets himself up as emperor. The play recounts his story in flashbacks as Brutus makes his way through the jungle in an attempt to escape former subjects who have rebelled against him.
Lorraine Vivian Hansberry was a playwright and writer. She was the first African-American female author to have a play performed on Broadway. Her best known work, the play A Raisin in the Sun, highlights the lives of Black Americans living under racial segregation in Chicago. The title of the play was taken from the poem "Harlem" by Langston Hughes: "What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?" At the age of 29, she won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award — making her the first African-American dramatist, the fifth woman, and the youngest playwright to do so. Hansberry's family had struggled against segregation, challenging a restrictive covenant and eventually provoking the 1940 Supreme Court case Hansberry v. Lee.
The Federal Theatre Project was a theatre program established during the Great Depression as part of the New Deal to fund live artistic performances and entertainment programs in the United States. It was one of five Federal Project Number One projects sponsored by the Works Progress Administration, created not as a cultural activity but as a relief measure to employ artists, writers, directors, and theater workers. It was shaped by national director Hallie Flanagan into a federation of regional theaters that created relevant art, encouraged experimentation in new forms and techniques, and made it possible for millions of Americans to see live theatre for the first time. Although The Federal Theatre project consumed only 0.5% of the allocated budget from the WPA and was widely considered a commercial and critical success, the project became a source of heated political contention. The House Un-American Activities Committee claimed the content of the FTP's productions were supporting racial integration between black and white Americans while also perpetuating an anti-capitalist communist agenda and cancelled funding for the project on June 30, 1939.
Henrietta Vinton Davis was an African-American elocutionist, dramatist, and impersonator. In addition to being "the premier actor of all nineteenth-century black performers on the dramatic stage", Davis was proclaimed by Marcus Garvey to be the "greatest woman of the Negro race today".
Sir Christopher James Hampton is a British playwright, screenwriter, translator and film director. He is best known for his play Les Liaisons Dangereuses based on the novel of the same name and the film version Dangerous Liaisons (1988), which received the Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. He was nominated in the same category for his 2007 film adaptation of Ian McEwan's novel Atonement.
The Almeida Theatre, opened in 1980, is a 325-seat producing house with an international reputation, which takes its name from the street on which it is located, off Upper Street, in the London Borough of Islington. The theatre produces a diverse range of drama. Successful plays are often transferred to West End theatres.
Canada Lee was an American actor who pioneered roles for African Americans. After careers as a jockey, boxer and musician, he became an actor in the Federal Theatre Project, including the 1936 production of Macbeth adapted and directed by Orson Welles. Lee later starred in Welles's original Broadway production of Native Son (1941). A champion of civil rights in the 1930s and 1940s, Lee was blacklisted and died shortly before he was scheduled to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee. He advanced the African American tradition in theatre pioneered by such actors as Paul Robeson. Lee was the father of actor Carl Lee.
Rodney Ackland was an English playwright, actor, theatre director and screenwriter.
Lonne Elder III was an American actor, playwright and screenwriter. Elder was one of the leading African American figures who aggressively informed the New York theater world with social and political consciousness. He also wrote scripts for television and film. His most well known play, Ceremonies in Dark Old Men won him a Drama Desk Award for Most Promising Playwright and was nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. The play, which was about a Harlem barber and his family, was produced by the Negro Ensemble Company in 1969.
Lolita Chakrabarti is an English actress and writer.
The Negro Ensemble Company (NEC) is a New York City-based theater company and workshop established in 1967 by playwright Douglas Turner Ward, producer-actor Robert Hooks, and theater manager Gerald S. Krone, with funding from the Ford Foundation. The company's focus on original works with themes based in the black experience with an international perspective created a canon of theatrical works and an audience for writers who came later, such as August Wilson, Suzan-Lori Parks, and others.
James Theodore Ward was a leftist political playwright and theatre educator during the first half of the 20th century and one of the earliest contributors to the Black Chicago Renaissance. Often referred to as the "dean of black dramatists," Ward was well known for tackling controversial topics related to African-American urban life during the Great Depression. His staged works were lauded for their innovative depiction of the black experience, most notably for doing away with the spiritual ballads and feverish dancing that dominated "Negro theatricals" of his time in favor of a more nuanced, naturalistic approach to plot and character.
Eulalie Spence was a black writer, teacher, director, actress and playwright from the British West Indies. She was an influential member of the Harlem Renaissance, writing fourteen plays, at least five of which were published. Spence, who described herself as a "folk dramatist" who made plays for fun and entertainment, was considered one of the most experienced female playwrights before the 1950s, and received more recognition than other black playwrights of the Harlem Renaissance period, winning several competitions. She presented several plays with W.E.B. Du Bois' Krigwa Players, of which she was a member from 1926 to 1928. Spence was also a mentor to theatrical producer Joseph Papp, founder of The Public Theater and the accompanying festival currently known as Shakespeare in the Park.
Eden is a 1976 play by American playwright Steve Carter. Set in the 1920s, it is the first of Carter's Caribbean trilogy. Eden explores intra-racial conflicts between recent immigrants from the Caribbean and the African-American population. The West Coast premiere of this critically acclaimed play received five Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards.
Jenny Jules is an English actress. She started her acting career as a member of the youth theatre programme at the Tricycle Theatre in Kilburn, London. Her career has been closely linked with the Tricycle Theatre where she has acted numerous times; her credits there include two plays by August Wilson, both directed by Paulette Randall: Two Trains Running and Gem of the Ocean, Walk Hard by Abram Hill, Wine in the Wilderness by Alice Childress, the dramatic reconstruction of the inquiry into the murder of Stephen Lawrence, The Colour of Justice, and Lynn Nottage's Fabulation, directed by Indhu Rubasingham. In 1992, she won a Time Out Award for her portrayal of Mediyah in Pecong at the Tricycle Theatre. That same year, she appeared with Helen Mirren on the second installment of Prime Suspect for Granada Television/ITV.
Barrington John Reckord, known as Barry Reckord, was a Jamaican playwright, one of the earliest Caribbean writers to make a contribution to theatre in Britain. His brother was the actor and director Lloyd Reckord, with whom he sometimes worked.
Chimerica is a 2013 play by the British dramatist Lucy Kirkwood. It draws its title from the term Chimerica, referring to the predominance of China and America in modern geopolitics. The play premiered in London at the Almeida Theatre and was directed by Lyndsey Turner. Turner's production received several awards and was well-reviewed. A Channel 4 four-part miniseries of the same name based on the play was released in 2019.
Earnest Sevier Cox was an American Methodist preacher, political activist and white-supremacist. He is best known for his political campaigning in favor of stricter segregation between blacks and whites in the United States through tougher anti-miscegenation laws, and for his advocacy for "repatriation" of African Americans to Africa, and for his book White America. He is also noted for having mediated collaboration between white southern segregationists and African American separatist organizations such as UNIA and the Peace Movement of Ethiopia to advocate for repatriation legislation, and for having been a personal friend of black racial separatist Marcus Garvey.
Adetunji "Tunji" Kasim is a Scottish actor. He is best known for his role as Joe Bailey in Nearly Famous, and Hugo Scott, an art teacher in Shetland.
Garland Anderson was an American playwright and speaker, known for his contributions to African-American literature. After having a full-length drama on Broadway, Anderson gave talks on empowerment and success largely related to the New Thought movement. Born in Wichita, Kansas, his family moved to Sacramento, California. Anderson left home at an early age, working as a newsboy, railroad porter and hotel bellhop. In his late 30s he read a book about New Thought, saw a play by Channing Pollack and thought that his life experience and new attitude had the makings of a play. Anderson wrote the initial version of Appearances; with the assistance of Al Jolson, the play was produced on Broadway. Although it was not a success, Anderson's industry and can-do attitude were appreciated. The play was produced several times and toured the US and the UK. Anderson settled in the UK, inventing a malted-milk product and giving religious talks. He received support from Dean of Canterbury Dick Sheppard, and returned to the US for a speaking tour. During the tour, he became a New Thought minister and married Doris Sequirra. After their return to England, she wrote a book about their experiences which was published in the UK and the US. Anderson wrote other plays and books; in early 1939 he was promoting his book, Uncommon Sense, as a possible play. After having a heart attack in London, he died in New York a few days after his return. Anderson was cremated, and Doris brought his remains back to the UK.
