Biography

Charles Fuller was born on March 5, 1939 to parents Charles H. Sr. and Lillian Anderson Fuller of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Fuller attended Philadelphia’s Roman Catholic High School and graduated in 1956. During his high school years, Fuller spent countless hours in the school library, and competed with a friend, Larry Neal, to become the first to read every book in the school’s collection. This experience helped spawn Fuller’s dream of becoming a writer.

After graduation from high school, Fuller attended Villanova University in Pennsylvania between 1956 and 1958. He then enlisted in the U. S. Army and spent the next four years stationed in Japan and Korea. Charles Fuller began his writing career in Philadelphia during the 1960s, writing mostly poetry, short stories, and essays in his spare time while working various jobs throughout Philadelphia. In 1965, Fuller decided to continue his education and enrolled in La Salle College (now La Salle University) which he attended until 1968. During his time at La Salle, Fuller began writing short plays for a theater group in Philadelphia that became the Afro-American Theatre of Philadelphia. He helped found this theater, and served as co-director until he moved to New York in 1970. Fuller’s first critical acclaim as a playwright came with the production of his play, The Village: A Party in 1968. The Village was first produced by Princeton’s McCarter Theatre, and later it ran off-Broadway in New York where it was re-titled The Perfect Party.

It was on the heels of this success that Fuller decided to move to New York and devote himself to writing full-time. During the 1970s, he wrote many plays that were produced off-Broadway. In 1975, Fuller penned the first of his three most famous plays, The Brownsville Raid, a play based on true events which occurred near an Army base in Texas in 1906. The second of his most successful plays, Zooman and the Sign was first produced in 1980. Fuller won two Obie Awards (an award given for off-Broadway productions), in 1980 for Zooman. In 1981, Fuller suffered a great loss when his childhood friend, Larry Neal, who also became a playwright, died of a heart attack. Fuller decided to honor his friend by writing what became his most celebrated work, A Soldier’s Play. This play ran off-Broadway for more than a year and earned the 1982 Pulitzer Prize for Drama. (Full bio)

Plays

THE SUNFLOWER MAJORETTE (1970) 

A short play that concerns a woman who is in love with a married man who has just left her apartment. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 1 (1f)

Characters: Willa Mae Wright Nelson

Publication: The Sunflower Majorette. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

EMMA (1970) 

A domestic drama about a southern family whose son is killed in a railroad strike.

Cast Requirement: 4 (2f, 2m)

Characters: Emma Tate, Nathan Tate, Bernard Tate, Sarah Pritchard

Publication: Emma. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

WEDNESDAY (1971)

Cast Requirement: 7 (2f, 5m)

Characters: Reverend Clement Sugar, Lucille Sugar, Jackie Sugar, Oscar Sugar, Shemy Divine, Harris Drinks, Louis O’Brian

Publication: Wednesday. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

SARAH LOVE, SWEET SARAH LOVE (1971) 

A domestic comedy that concerns the love affair of a woman who has left the South and tries to make it in Philadelphia in 1936. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 2 (1f, 1m)

Characters: Sarah Pritchard, Harris Drinks

Publication: Sarah Love, Sweet Sarah Love. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

THE GAME (1972) 

A historical drama set in 1947 about the return of a child to his mother after he has lived with his aunt for six years, and the entrance of Jackie Robinson into the national baseball scene. (Source) 

Cast Requirement: 5 (2f, 3m)

Characters: Reuben Tate, Emma Tate, Maybelle Tate Pritchard Bey, Ahmran Abdullah Bey, Harris Drinks

Publication: The Game. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

THE CANDIDATE (1974)

Political drama about a black candidate's attempt to win a mayoral primary election.

Cast Requirement: 16+

Characters: Kenneth Staton, Jesse Williams, Scott Feldman, Arlen Gold, Ed Johnson, Mary Staton, Jeannie Gold, Peter Easton, Susan Easton, Ted Vance, Randy Randolph, Jomo Askia, John Miller, Maury, Dori, Frank, Reporters, Campaign People, Policemen, Doctor

Publication: The Candidate. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

FIRST LOVE (1974) 

A drama concerning the problems of boys in the eighth grade during the fifties and their girls. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 6 (1f, 5m)

Characters: Jesse Blackwell, Reuben Tate, Larry Nelson, Edgar Taylor, Rachel Smith, Pete

Publication: First Love. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

IN THE DEEPEST PART OF SLEEP (1974) 

Set in 1956, the play continues the life of a Black family and deals with a young man’s development from adolescence to manhood. 

Cast Requirement: 4 (2f, 2m)

Characters: Maybelle, Reuben, Lyla, Ashe

Publication: In the Deepest Part of Sleep. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

THE RISE (1974) 

The play follows some of the activities of Marcus Garvey as he combatted Negro politicians and agitated whites in Harlem. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 17+

Characters: Brother Marcus, Henry Jeffers, Retha Jeffers, Aija, Man, Reuben Hall, Marvin, Steele, Black Leader, Dean, Curtis, Whalan, Rutledge, Three Cops, Crowd, Man’s Voice, Woman’s Voice

Publication: The Rise. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

THE BROWNSVILLE RAID (1975) 

The Brownsville Raid is based on the Brownsville Affair, an altercation between black soldiers and white civilians in Brownsville, Texas in 1906, which led to an entire black regiment being dishonorably discharged though later pardoned in 1976. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 15 (1f, 14m)

Characters: Mingo Saunders, Dolly Saunders, Corporal Clifford L. Adair, Corporal Boyd Conjers, Private Richard Johnson, Private James W. Newton, Private James Holliman, Private Dorsey Willis, The Captain, The Orderly, Mayor Combs, Major Blockson, General Garlin, President Theodore Roosevelt, Emmett Scott

Publication: Fuller, Charles. 1975. The Brownsville Raid. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Literary Cavalcade. (Link)

ZOOMAN AND THE SIGN (1980) 

Zooman, a Black teen in Philadelphia, senselessly terrorizes his community without regard to race. When he kills a 12-year-old Black girl on the street, all witnesses refuse to talk. Bereaved and infuriated, the dead girl's father posts a sign accusing the entire community of cowardice in the face of escalating violence. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 9 (3f, 6m)

Characters: Zooman, Rachel Tate, Emmett Tate, Reuben Tate, Victor Tate, Russell Adams, Donald Jackson, Ash Boswell, Grace Georges

Publication: Zooman and the Sign. Nelson Doubleday, 1982. (Link)

A SOLDIER’S PLAY (1981)

In a segregated Louisiana army camp in 1944, the murder of a rancorous Black sergeant stirs deep-seated animosity and corruption among the soldiers under his command. When a clean-cut Northern captain arrives to investigate, truths are confessed and a shocking secret is revealed. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 12 (12m)

Characters: Tech Sergeant Vernon C. Waters, Captain Charles Taylor, Corporal Bernard Cobb, Private First Class Melvin Peterson, Corporal Ellis, Private Louis Henson, Private James Wilkie, Private Tony Smalls, Captain Richard Davenport, Private C.J. Memphis, Lieutenant Byrd, Captain Wilcox

Publication: A Soldier’s Play. Hill and Wang, 1982. (Link)

SALLY (1988)

Sally, the eponymous heroine, is a South Carolina freedwoman whose questionable husband has just died from the wrong concoction administered by Becky, the conjure woman. Sally and her teenage son, Yocum, meet Prince, a runaway slave who has risen to sergeant in the first Black Union regiment. This play is part of Fuller’s We play cycle. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 13+

Characters: Pell, Sally, Yocum, Vendross, Prince Logan, Sutton, Washington, Jonquil, The Girl, Becky, General, Lieutenant Cable, Reporter

Publication: Sally. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

PRINCE (1988) 

Prince follows the conflict between becoming wage slaves in the cotton fields and pressing forward toward greater self-fulfillment. This play is part of Fuller’s We play cycle. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 15+

Characters: Carrie, Tiche, Mary, Quash, Burner, Stubbs, Dr. Bernard, White Men, Lu, Captain, Michaels, Prince Logan, Norman, The Officer, Kellogg, Hannah

Publication: Prince. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

JONQUIL (1990) 

Jonquil portrays the brutal legacy of the Klu Klux Klan’s racial violence and the tragic repercussions of resistance. The play is part of a cycle entitled We, which revisits American history with a focus on African American experiences during and after the Civil War. The cycle underscores the internal conflicts and societal constraints faced by African Americans, shifting focus from interracial to intra-racial dynamics. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 21 (6f, 15m)

Characters:  Sally, Klux 1, Klux 2, Klux 3, Jonquil, Calvin, Three Black Farmers, Cable, Judge Bridges, Hannah, Aunt Bessie, Isaiah, George, Bobby, Daniel, Silas, Woman, Colson, Hallie

Publication: Jonquil. Alexander Street Press, 2005. (Link)*

ONE NIGHT (2013) 

After surviving a fire in a homeless shelter, two Iraqi Freedom vets, Alicia G. and Horace Lloyd, are sent to a motel outside the city where they will be safe for the night. Both suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder.

Cast Requirement: 5 (2f, 3m)

Characters:  Alicia G., Horace Lloyd, Doug Mensing, The Lieutenant, A Major

Publication: One Night. Dramatic Publishing Company, 2015. (Link)

UNPUBLISHED

THE PERFECT PARTY (1968)

A domestic drama whose problem centers around a group of integrated couples in mixed-marriages; when the Black head of the group wants to leave to find his roots, difficulties and murder occur. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 12 (6f, 6m)

Characters:  N/A

Publication: N/A

IN MY MANY NAMES AND DAYS (1972)

A collection of six one-act plays chronicling the life of a family between 1920 and 1969.

Cast Requirement: N/A

Characters: N/A

Publication: “Charles Fuller plays, 1971-1974.” Archival Material. New York Public Library. (Link)*

THE LAY OUT LETTER (1975)

Domestic drama about a family in which the mother has just died and a letter she wrote to them that is delivered after her death. (Source)

Cast Requirement: 8 (4f, 4m)

Characters:  N/A 

Publication: N/A

RESOURCES