Charles Smith papers

Biographical / Historical

A member of the Victory Gardens Playwrights Ensemble, Charles Smith has seen his plays produced throughout Chicago and the United States by companies such as the Goodman Theatre, the Berkeley Repertory Theatre, the Seattle Repertory Theatre, and the St. Louis Black Repertory Theatre. Smith is also the author of two Emmy Award-winning teleplays, Fast Break to Glory and Pequito. Nine of Smith's plays, including Takunda, Jelly Belly, Cane, and The Sutherland, all premiered at the Victory Gardens Theatre. His play, Denmark, was the inaugural production of the reopening of Victory Gardens Theater at the Biograph Theater in 2006 (www.csplays.com). Smith is an alumnus playwright of New Dramatists, a graduate of the University of Iowa Playwrights Workshop, and one of the founding members of the Playwrights Ensemble at Victory Gardens Theatre in Chicago. He has taught playwriting and creative writing extensively. He is currently head of the Professional Playwriting Program at Ohio University, Distinguished Professor of Playwriting, and Ohio University Presidential Research Scholar in the Arts and Humanities. Many of Smith's plays address African American topics. Portraying Chicago's historic South Side jazz scene, The Sutherland is the story of a young musician who experiences the destruction of the race riots during the 1960s. In 1995, Smith's play Black Star Line, commissioned by the Goodman, was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. The story chronicles the rise of Marcus Garvey and the Back to America movement of the 1920s.