Afrika Brown is a Playwright, Poet, Screenwriter, and Director. She began her career as a journalist writing fashion, lifestyle, and entertainment features. Brown’s love for writing started in her native home of Newark, New Jersey; early exposure to an eclectic tapestry of music made Brown a voracious gatherer of words and a lover of movement and rhythms. Music is part of her cellular structure. From House to Hip Hop to Rock and Roll and Jazz, there is a lyrical syncopation in her writing. The thump of these genres lives in her poetry, and her parents love of life and art made her the perfect sponge for creative culture.
Readers will appreciate Brown’s raw and authentic view of the world. She is a lover of humanity yet holds no punches as a sensual truthteller; she uses her writing as a tool to explore the many complicated facets of life, allowing the reader to dig deeper into their own psyche and biases, simply in search of solace.
In 2006, Brown published Sepia Sapphire, a collection of poetry and in 2007, Brown’s weekly chapter series Diary of a Breakup was featured on Universitychic.com. In 2014, The Outing played at Open Hydrant’s Urban Waves Festival, Manhattan Repertory Summer Shorts Festival, and The Strawberry Festival. In 2015, hersocio-political play Strange Fruit Redux premiered at Manhattan Repertory Theatre’s 10th Anniversary Event and participated in the Midtown International Theatre Festival. In 2016, Strange Fruit Redux played festivals in North Carolina and Michigan. 2016 Brown premiered Slow Bullet, My Three Loves at Manhattan Repertory Theatre, and in 2017, she traveled to Barcelona to take part of a residency at Can Serrat. Brown is a Resident Playwright atManhattan Repertory Theatre, a 2018 Alliance of Los Angeles Playwrights Fellow, and her short film script, After…Suite 220, won the 2019 Lovesick Film Festival. She is currently co-producing her second play, THE FIGHT, which will go into workshop in 2022.