Suzan-Lori Parks

Suzan-Lori Parks was born in Fort Knox, Kentucky on May 10, 1963. She is a playwright, screenwriter and novelist. Parks is the first African American woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for Drama. She won in 2002 for her 2001 play Topdog/Underdog. She was also a Pulitzer Prize Drama Finalist for her play “Father Comes Home From the Wars, Parts 1, 2 & 3”. Parks’ first screenplay was for Spike Lee”s 1996 film Girl 6. She later worked with Oprah Winfrey’s Harpo Productions on screenplays for Their Eyes Were Watching God (2005) and The Great Debaters (2007).

Ms. Parks is a MacArthur Fellow and Master Writer Chaor at the Pulic Theater. She was married to blues musician Paul Oscher and teaches playwriting at Tisch School of the Arts in the Rita & Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing.

Learn more at Suzan-Lori Parks’s official website.