Today we honor the life and legacy of esteemed playwright August Wilson.
August Wilson is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright. Mr. Wilson s plays have been produced at theaters all over the world, including over a dozen Broadway productions of his work. He is the namesake of Broadway s August Wilson Theatre (245 W. 52nd Street) and has been referred to as the theatre s poet of Black America
Stage Works
August Wilson is best known as the author of the American Century Cycle, a series of ten plays including Gem of the Ocean, Joe Turner s Come and Gone, Ma Rainey s Black Bottom, The Piano Lesson, Seven Guitars, Fences, Two Trains Running, Jitney, King Hedley II, and Radio Golf. These works explore the heritage and experience of African Americans, decade-by-decade, over the course of the twentieth century.
“Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom” was August Wilson’s first play to hit Broadway. Now it’s his second to become a feature film. The Pittsburgh-born playwright’s namesake August Wilson Center for African American Culture marks the occasion with a virtual panel discussion featuring some of the new film’s distinguished creative team. Ma Rainey Redux Part II virtual panel discussion: 7 p.m. Fri., Dec. 18
The panel on Fri., Dec. 18 – the same day the film premieres on Netflix – includes director and Broadway veteran George C. Wolfe; the film’s screenwriter, the actor and Wilson collaborator Ruben Santiago-Hudson; and Constanza Romero, Wilson’s widow and the film’s executive producer. Moderator Jessica Lanay, the Center’s literary curator, says Wilson’s drama illuminates the little-known roots of American popular culture.