Important work being done here. Perhaps reductive conclusion in this piece about black female playwrights and their work this season.
Black Female Playwrights Want You to Face Facts. The Hard Ones.
1) These are wonderful writers, all four of them. Three of them I know personally and can attest they are wonderful humans as well. You should go see their work, whenever, wherever.
2) These playwrights aren't in sync with Black Lives Matter, these playwrights have always written provocative, important work about race, gender and culture. You could say that more Americans are now in sync with these and other writers.
3) Black Female Playwrights are not a monolith.
4) The conversation could be, hey, look, New York City theaters are programming work by black female writers and here are at least four you should see. And some numbers about racial and gender parity and which theaters are taking the lead and how that fares socially and commercially for the theaters.
5) Write an article about all the fking amazing black female playwrights that is not tied into the idea of Black Lives Matter as some explanation for why we're seeing their plays or that it's new that these women (and others) are writing fierce plays.
6) Is this a euphemism for the dismissive, reductive and condescending Angry Black Woman? Cause you'd be angry too if you got the short end of the stick for your race and gender all the damn time, and your definition of angry might not even be a logical definition of what it is to make art, to breathe, to exist in a country that wants to extinguish your voice and personhood.
Am I glad any and every time these writers get press, hell yes. Am I glad it may bring more people to their work, hell yes. I'd also like to see these artists' work contextualized not by a single movement, but by a lifelong journey against oppression and white imperialism. But that's me, I'm picky that way.
Just for the fun of it, I'm gonna post a few names of female playwrights of color who's work you might want to check out in addition to Sarah Jones, Lynn Nottage, Suzan-Lori Parks and Anna Deveare Smith: Chisa Hutchinson, Zakiyyah Alexander, Kirsten Greenidge, Tanya Everett, Christina Anderson, Dominique Morisseau, Janine Nabers, Rhada Blank,Shontina Vernon, Eisa Davis, D Lavinia Grays, Lenelle Moises, Danai Guirara, Sharon Washington, Sharon Bridgforth, Jacqueline E. Lawton, Nikkole Salter Adrienne Kennedy, Dael Orlandersmith, Ntozake Shange, Tracy Scott Wilson, Tanya Barfield, Nambi Kelley, Katori Hall .... just a few top of mind, there are so many more,
And please go to the theater, support the work of POC, women, trans, queer and other marginalized voices--put your money where your mouth is and take your money where your mouth doesn't want to be.
