Playwright August Wilson has won two Pulitzer Prizes for his plays Fences (1987) and The Piano Lesson (1990). Javon Johnson's play Papa's Blues (Dramatic Publishing) was the 1998 winner of the Lorraine Hansberry Award. The following conversation regarding the politics of black theatre appeared in USA Today and is reprinted with the playwrights' permission. August Wilson: I first got involved in theater in 1968, at the height of a social tumult. I was a poet. I got into theater in Pittsburgh with the idea of using [it] as a tool to raise consciousness, politicize the community. Javon Johnson: Mine was more of an accident. I was very observant. The theater allowed me to tap into that inner spirit and those powers. A.W.: I'm trying to take culture and put it onstage, demonstrate it is capable of sustaining you. There is no idea that can't be contained by life: Asian life, European life, certainly black life. My plays are about love, honor, duty, betrayal — things humans have written about since the beginning of time. J.J.: I helped start a theater in Chicago, the Congo Square Company. A flyer came out that included my play Hambone. It labeled me as an African-American playwright. I looked at the other writer bios; they were labeled playwrights. It bothered me. Why can't I just be an artist? My generation is conscious of this question. A.W.: As are we all. You have to make your own definition of yourself. That's crucial. When I do interviews, I am expected to become some sociologist. I have to speak to the condition of black America. My preference would be: Let's talk about theater. Let's talk about art. The fact that I am black is self-evident. J.J.: I've always been apolitical. I wanted to ask you: How much responsibility should I own up to as far as representing the African-American community? A.W.: The black power movement of the '60s tried to force people to write about certain things. What comes forth from you as an artist cannot be controlled. But you have responsibilities as a global citizen. Your history dictates your duty. And by writing about black people, you are not limiting yourself. The experiences of African-Americans are as wide open as God's closet. J.J.: Who influenced you? A.W.: The blues, (Amiri) Baraka, the writer, and Romare Bearden, the canvas painter and collage-ist. Black life in all its richness and fullness without sentimentality, an honesty I hadn't seen expressed before. You can do that, I thought. J.J.: Funny, I was also influenced by music. But more R&B than hip-hop. A lot of times when I write, I'm playing a blues tape or some R&B from the '70s. I think a lot of hip-hop needs to reach back and find out where what they are doing started from. Hambone deals with that. A.W.: The play that changed black theater forever would have to be A Raisin in the Sun, by Lorraine Hansberry. J.J.: I would agree. A.W.: If you're dealing with the human condition ... you will recognize the universal aspects of [it]. J.J.: I think the conflict for African-American playwrights is that it's a struggle for us to tell our stories because of the need for validation. When we look at material written by whites, we don't question it, and they're not insecure about what they've written. A.W.: As soon as white folks say a play's good, the theater is jammed with blacks and whites. We have to get to the point where our critical observations and reviews are just as much validation as anybody's. J.J.: I think I'm going to adopt yet another one of your phrases, "The struggle will continue. . ." A.W.: You have the gift. No question about it, you have the gift. But along with it comes the responsibility. —Moderated by Ralph Wiley author of Why Black People Tend to Shout. Copyright 2003 USA WEEKEND. All rights reserved. USA WEEKEND is a division of Gannett Co. Inc. (updated 12/17/2002). August Wilson photo by Joseph Mehling and Javon Johnson photo by Mark Lustgarden.

Javon Johnson is a native of Anderson, South Carolina. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild, Screen Actor's Guild, and Kuntu Repertory Theatre and Kuntu Writer's Workshop Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He received his Bachelors of Arts from South Carolina State University and is a Masters of Fine Arts candidate at the University of Pittsburgh. Some of his acting credits include the Provost in Measure for Measure for Pittsburgh Public Theatre, Guy in Blues for and Alabama Sky for Kuntu Repertory Theatre, Cory in Fences for Hilton Head Playhouse, Wendal in Before It Hits Home, Pericles in Pericles, Macbeth in Macbeth, and Joe in Pill Hill. Some of his film credits include Louis Price in The Temptations for NBC, Gangster in Dogma for Tristar Pictures, and Sportin' Life in Porgy: A Gullah Version for SC Educational Television. As a writer, Johnson has been the recipient of several awards and honors including 1999 finalist for the Allen Lee Hughes Fellowship at Arena Stage of Washington, DC; 1998 Kennedy Center Fellowship to attend the Eugene O'Neill National Playwrights Conference; 1999 Pittsburgh Playwright Award, 1998 Yukon/Pacific New Play Award, and 1998 Lorraine Hansberry Award for Papa's Blues; second place recipient of 1999 Lorraine Hansberry Award for A Noose for Bettyann; and 1998 Best-One Act Play for American College Theatre Festival Region II competition for The Pawn. He has had plays read at Lanford Wilson's Playwright's Retreat, stage reading by CAP21 and Lab Theatre Company in New York, and productions at the Grahamstown Festival in South Africa, Kuntu Repertoy Theatre, and Pittsburgh's New Voices. Johnson has also served as a Panelist for the PlayLab competition at the 1999 Edward Albee Seventh Annual Theatre Conference of Valdez, Alaska.