Photo by Jake Chessum.
|
. . . I’ve always had a relationship with language, telling stories, storytelling. I guess it’s organic to me. It’s connected to me in the same way my hands are connected to me, or my elbows or knees . . . It’s like breathing for me – the act of writing. Christina Anderson is an American playwright and educator from Kansas City, Kansas, whose work has appeared at the Public Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, Penumbra Theatre Company, Playwrights Horizons, and many more. Her plays have received many notable honors, including the Inaugural Harper Lee Award for Playwriting, the Lorraine Hansberry Award, two Playwrights of New York (PoNY) nominations, and three Susan Smith Blackburn nominations. She has a B.A. from Brown and an M.F.A from Yale School of Drama, where she studied under Paula Vogel.
She is currently a Resident Playwright at New Dramatists and the social justice theatre company Epic Theatre Ensemble. She has served as an Assistant Professor of Playwriting at Purchase College, and as the interim Head of Playwriting at Brown University. |
Selected Work
All synopses from Christina Anderson's website.
HOW TO CATCH CREATION
A wrongly convicted man is released from prison after 25 years. As he settles into a new life he begins the quest to become a father. Spanning more than 40 years, this play explores family, connection, parenthood, and right to start over.
THE BRIDGETTE HOBBS CONNECTION
When Bridgette begins listening to old surveillance tapes of her parents she has no idea what it will unearth about her mom's disappearance - or that it will lead to her own.
pen/man/ship
1896: A father and son board a ship heading for Africa on a mysterious mission with an opinionated young woman. On the open sea, an unexpected detour resurrects family secrets and reveals true intentions, fundamentally changing the course of their journey and their lives forever.
THE ASHES UNDER GAIT CITY
Simone The Believer, a popular internet guru, launches a campaign to convince Black Americans to return to an Oregon city that was rebuilt without them after a devastating fire. She assembles a small group of converts, but real world conflict quickly confronts her real world quest. The locals threaten to chase her out, most of her digital followers are unwilling to uproot, and personal struggles shake her faith. Determined to create a flesh and bone community, Simone triggers a violent act with the hope that it will ignite a migration.
MAN IN LOVE
1936. A metropolis divided by segregation and struck by economic turmoil. Rent parties rage above, while men hungry for work and love roam the streets. In this concrete jungle, a series of black female bodies turn up and a pattern emerges. Reactions vary across the city — hot-tempered ex-con Walker remains oblivious; Darlynn is anxious, but then again, she’s always anxious; and her neighbor Paul Pare Jr., a young, charming black man stays cool. Man in Love examines a world of quiet desperation in hard times, where a criminal and his victims can get lost in the crowd.
A wrongly convicted man is released from prison after 25 years. As he settles into a new life he begins the quest to become a father. Spanning more than 40 years, this play explores family, connection, parenthood, and right to start over.
THE BRIDGETTE HOBBS CONNECTION
When Bridgette begins listening to old surveillance tapes of her parents she has no idea what it will unearth about her mom's disappearance - or that it will lead to her own.
pen/man/ship
1896: A father and son board a ship heading for Africa on a mysterious mission with an opinionated young woman. On the open sea, an unexpected detour resurrects family secrets and reveals true intentions, fundamentally changing the course of their journey and their lives forever.
THE ASHES UNDER GAIT CITY
Simone The Believer, a popular internet guru, launches a campaign to convince Black Americans to return to an Oregon city that was rebuilt without them after a devastating fire. She assembles a small group of converts, but real world conflict quickly confronts her real world quest. The locals threaten to chase her out, most of her digital followers are unwilling to uproot, and personal struggles shake her faith. Determined to create a flesh and bone community, Simone triggers a violent act with the hope that it will ignite a migration.
MAN IN LOVE
1936. A metropolis divided by segregation and struck by economic turmoil. Rent parties rage above, while men hungry for work and love roam the streets. In this concrete jungle, a series of black female bodies turn up and a pattern emerges. Reactions vary across the city — hot-tempered ex-con Walker remains oblivious; Darlynn is anxious, but then again, she’s always anxious; and her neighbor Paul Pare Jr., a young, charming black man stays cool. Man in Love examines a world of quiet desperation in hard times, where a criminal and his victims can get lost in the crowd.