Playwright Richard Wesley Signs New Anthology at The Drama Book Shop Tonight

The Drama Book Shop will host playwright Richard Wesley, who will be discussing and signing his new anthology tonight, February 18th at 6:00pm.

Richard Wesley, Associate Professor in Playwriting and Screenwriting. He was educated at Howard University in Washington, DC, graduating with a BFA in 1967. His plays include, The Black Terror, a Drama Desk winner, produced at the New York Shakespeare Festival's Public Theatre, in 1971; The Mighty Gents, an Audelco Award winner, premiered on Broadway in 1978. The 1970s also saw Prof. Wesley embark on a motion picture career, penning screenplays for the motion pictures, Uptown Saturday Night (1974), Let's Do It Again (Warner Bros., 1975), Native Son (1984) and Fast Forward (Columbia Pictures, 1985). Prof. Wesley's teleplays include, Murder Without Motive (1991), Mandela And De Klerk(1997), and Bojangles (2000). He has also written episodes for the television series, Fallen Angels and 100 Centre Street. Prof. Wesley served as an Adjunct at the following institutions: Manhattanville College, Wesleyan University, Borough of Manhattan Community College and Rutgers University.

This anthology of five full-length plays collectively outlines a cultural history of black America in the post-Civil Rights era, from the late 20th century through the first decades of the 21st. Black Terrorlooks at the radical politics of the Black Power era; The Sirens, the destabilization of black familial and social life in the early 1970s; The Mighty Gents, the destructiveness of "black macho" in the late 1970s; The Talented Tenth, the midlife crisis and the end of idealism in the black middle class in the early 1980s; and Autumn, the new generational paradigm in black urban politics in the early 21st century.

Each of the plays included in this anthology was born out of the idea of the public thinker, and what Arthur Miller would refer to as the importance of an individual conscience -- As well as the belief that each generation must give back, must inform and inspire the generation that follows. No people -- and certainly not the African Americans still striving and struggling in the 21st century -- can thrive if they fail to adhere to that simple idea.

The anthology will be available for sale at The Drama Book Shop, and is priced at $19.99. The Drama Book Shop is located at 250 West 40th Street between 7th and 8th Avenues.