The seed of the group was planted in 1989 at the close of a seminar at Arena Stage that focused on the African American woman playwright. Panel member Karen Evans used her concluding remarks to talk about the loneliness of being Black and female in this profession and asked for the names and addresses of women in the audience who were playwrights. She held a meeting at her home the following month and became BWPG's president and founder. Since then the group has met regularly on a monthly basis to provide professional support to its members. Incorporated in 1993, BWPG held its first retreat in 1999 and received 501 (c)3 status in 1999.
Staff Members
Karen L.B. Evans is President and Founder of the Black Women Playwrights’ Group. She has received Individual Fellowships in Playwriting from both the National Endowment for the Arts and the DC Commission on the Arts & Humanities. She was a Helen Hayes nominee for “Outstanding New Play” as well as a Sundance Institute finalist. Karen participated in the Eugene O’Neill National Playwrights’ Conference and is a recipient of the John F. Kennedy Center “Front & Center Award,&rdquo. She has also received the “Citation for Excellence in Design and Writing” from the Washington Education Press Association.
Her work has been published and presented by Meriwether Publishing, Applause Theater Books, The Discovery Channel Magazine, American Showcase Theatre and PBS. Ms. Evans’ current project is a musical adaptation of her book, You Must Remember This, a novel for the middle school reader, published by Hyperion Books for Children. She is also a recipient of a fellowship from the Weissberg Foundation to attend a playwriting seminar at New York’s Primary Stages.
Karen holds a BA with honors in Drama from Dartmouth College and an MFA in Playwriting from The Catholic University of America.