Suzan-Lori Parks, an African-American
playwright and screenwriter, was born on 10th May 1963 in Fort Knox,
Kentucky into a military family. As a child, she developed a taste for
folklore, mythology as well as wrote numerous short stories and songs.
In 1985,
she graduated from Mount Holyoke College (her B.A. theses was devoted to
English and German literature). Parks often underlines the contribution of this
school to her successful career. During fiction workshops, she met James
Baldwin, a widely acclaimed novelist and civil right activist, who noticed her
talent and suggested becoming a playwright. In order to understand theater
better, Parks took acting classes in London at the Drama Studio. After a year,
she returned to the USA, settled in New York City and started producing plays,
which brought her acclaim:
- Imperceptible Mutabilities in the Third
Kingdom (1989) – Obie
Award
- Betting on the Dust Commander (1990)
- The Death of the Last Black Man in the
Whole Entire World (1992)
- The America Play (1994)
- Venus (1996) – Obie Award
- In the Blood (1999)
- Fucking A (2000)
- Topdog/Underdog (2001) – the Pulitzer Prize for Drama
- 365 Days/365 Plays (2006)
- Ray Charles Live! (2007)
Parks also wrote a screenplay for Their Eyes Were Watching God (television
adaptation of Zora Neale Hurston’s novel under the same title) starring Halle
Berry and Girl 6 directed by Spike
Lee. She wrote one novel entitled Getting
Mother’s Body (2003) and is currently working on the second one.
by Marta MakoĊ
Selected sources:
