BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
Adrienne Kennedy was born Adrienne Lita Hawkins in Pittsburgh on
September 13, 1931. Her father was a social worker and executive
secretary of the YMCA and her mother was a teacher. Her maternal
grandfather was a wealthy white peach grower. She
grew up in Cleveland and attended Ohio State University where she
received a bachelor's degree in education in 1953. She was married
one month later to Joseph Kennedy and gave birth to a son.
After Joseph Kennedy returned from Korea, the family
moved to New York City to attend graduate school. Adrienne developed
her literary talents, attended creative writing classes at
Columbia University. However, after seven years she still remained
unpublished and unproduced. She travelled with her husband, by then a
professor at Hunter College, to Europe and Africa in 1960. Upon
arrival in Ghana she submitted a short story to the magazine
Black Orpheus. It was accepted.
At the age of 29 she wrote Funnyhouse of a Negro. It was
selected by Edward Albee to be produced in his workshop at Circle in
the Square. In 1962 she joined Edward Albee's Playwrights'
Workshop beginning over a thirty year career in theatre which
continues to this day. In 1992 the Great Lakes Theatre Company
organized a month long celebration of her work. A few years later the
Signature Theatre Company selected her as their playwright of the fall
season and produced seven of her plays.
Kennedy has been a lecturer at Yale and the University of
California at Berkeley,
and has taught playwrighting at Princeton and Brown. She has received
Guggenheim Fellowships, NEA, and Rockefeller Foundation Grants. In
1992, the mayor of Cleveland declared March 7 to be Adrienne Kennedy
Day.
PLAYS
- "Funnyhouse of a Negro"-1962
- First produced Off-Broadway at the Circle in the Square Theatre.
- "The Owl Answers"-1963
- First produced in Westport, Connecticut at White Barn Theatre;
first produced in New York City Off-Broadway at the Public Theatre on
January 12, 1969 along with "A Beast's Story" under the title
Cities in Bezique.
- "A Rat's Mass"-1966
- First produced in Boston by The Theatre Company; first produced
Off-Broadway at La Mama Experimental Theatre Lab in 1969.
- "The Lennon Play: In His Own Words"-1967
- First produced in London by The National Theatre.
- "A Movie Star Has to Star in Black and White"-1976
- First produced in New York by The Public Theatre Workshop.
- "The Ohio State Murders"-1992
- First produced in Cleveland.
- "Oedipus Rex"-2001
- Produced by the Hartford Stage.
- NY Times Review
AWARDS
- "Funnyhouse of a Negro"
- Obie Award in 1964.
CRITICAL/BIOGRAPHICAL RESOURCES
For full citations of the books listed, follow the links to the Resources Page.
Books marked with book covers or a 
are linked to an
Amazon.com record.
Adrienne
Kennedy in One Acts
African American Women Playwrights: A Research Guide
American Literature 63
Black
Writers
A
Bibliographical Guide to
African-American Women Writers
Black American Writers
Black American
Playwrights
Black Drama
Contemporary African American Female Playwrights
The
Cambridge Companion to American Women Playwrights
Contemporary Black Drama
Contemporary Black American Playwrights
and
Their Plays
Contemporary
Dramatists
Contemporary
Women Dramatists
Deadly
Triplets
Dictionary
of Black Theatre
The
Female Dramatist
Great Women Writers
Intersecting Boundaries: The Theatre of Adrienne Kennedy
Masterpieces
of African-American Literature
Masterplots
II
Modern
Drama: The Female
Canon
Kuntu Drama
New Black Playwrights
Oxford Companion to African American
Literature
Studies in Black Literature
SELECTED ARTICLES ABOUT THE AUTHOR
"Adrienne Kennedy and Shakespeare's Sister." Barnett,
Claudia. American Drama 5:2 (1996 Spring) pp.44-56.
"Adrienne Kennedy's Portrait of the Black Woman." Tener,
Robert L. Studies in Black Literature 6:2 (1975) pp.1-5.
"The American Dream in American Gothic: The Plays of Sam
Shepard and Adrienne Kennedy." Blau, Herbert. Modern Drama
27:4 1984 March) pp.520-539.
"'Cities in Bezique': Adrienne Kennedy's Expressionistic
Vision." Benston, Kimberly W. CLA Journal 20 (1976)
pp.235-44.
"Color Connections in Adrienne Kennedy's 'She Talks to
Beethoven'." Kolin, Philip C. Notes on Contemporary
Literature
24:2 (1994 Mar) pp.4-6.
"The Concomitant Forces of Placement: Re-Placing the
African-American Woman in Adrienne Kennedy's 'Funnyhouse of a Negro'
and
'Ohio State Murders'." Carbone, Melissa. Text & Presentation: the
Journal of the Comparative Drama Conference 14 (1993) pp.5-9.
"'For the Characters Are Myself': Adrienne Kennedy's
'Funnyhouse of a Negro'." Brown, Lorraine A. Negro American
Literature Forum 9 (1975) pp.86-88.
"Fragmented Selves in Adrienne Kennedy's 'Funnyhouse of a
Negro' and 'The Owl Answers'." Curb, Rosemary K. Theatre
Journal 32 (1980) pp.180-95.
"From the Zoo to the Funnyhouse: A Comparison of Edward Albee's
'The Zoo Story' with Adrienne Kennedy's 'Funnyhouse of a Negro'."
Kolin, Philip C.
Theatre Southwest (1989 April) pp.8-16.
"God and the Owls: The Sacred and the Profane in Adrienne
Kennedy's 'The Owl Answers'." McDonough, Carla J. Modern
Drama
40:3 (1997 Fall) pp.385-402.
"Her Dissonant Selves: The Semiotics of Plurality and
Bisexuality in Adrienne Kennedy's 'Funnyhouse of a Negro'." Oha,
Obododimma. American Drama 6: 2 (1997 Spring) pp.67-80.
"'In the Presence of Mine Enemies': Adrienne Kennedy's 'An
Evening with Dead Essex'." Zinman, Toby Silverman. Studies in
American Drama 6:1 (1991) pp.3-13.
"Intersecting Boundaries: The Surrealist Theatre of
Poet/Playwright Adrienne Kennedy." Bryant-Jackson, Paul. African
American Review 27:3 (1993 Fall) pp.495-500.
"An Interview with Adrienne Kennedy." Diamond, Elin.
Studies in American Drama 4 (1989) pp.143-157.
"Living the Answer: The Emergence of African American Feminist
Drama." Shinn, Thelma J. Studies in the Humanities 17:2
(1990 December) pp.149-59.
"A MELUS Interview: Adrienne Kennedy." Binder, Wolfgang.
Melus 12:3(1985 Fall) pp.99-108.
"Orpheus Ascending: Music, Race, and Gender in Adrienne
Kennedy's 'She Talks to Beethoven.'" Kolin, Philip C. African
American Review 28:2 (Summer 1994) pp.293(12).
"Owls and Rats in the American Funnyhouse: Adrienne Kennedy's
Drama." Sollors, Werner. American Literature 63:3 (1991
September) pp.507-32.
"A Prison of Object Relations: Adrienne Kennedy's 'Funnyhouse
of
a Negro'." Barnett, Claudia. Modern Drama 40:3 (1997 Fall)
pp.374-84.
"Probing the African-American Psyche: A Study of the
Protagonists of Funnyhouse of a Negro and Les Blancs." Shafee, Syed
Ali. Indian Journal of American Studies 24:2 (1994 Summer)
pp.83-88.
"Rethinking Identification: Kennedy, Freud, Brecht." Diamond,
Elin. Kenyon Review 15:2 (1993 Spring) pp.86-99.
"Reversing Blackface Minstrelsy, Improvising Racial Identity:
Adrienne Kennedy's 'Funnyhouse of a Negro.'" Thompson, Deborah.
Post Identity 1:1 (1997 Fall) pp.13-38.
" The Sanitized Spectacle: What's Birth Got to Do with It?
Adrienne Kennedy's 'A Movie Star Has to Star in Black and White'."
Kintz, Linda. Theatre Journal 44:1(1992 March) pp.67-86.
"Screening the Camera's Eye: Black and White Confrontations of
Technological Representation." Murray, Timothy. Modern Drama
28:1(1985 March) pp.110-124.
"'This Fundamental Challenge to Identity' Reproduction and
Representation in the Drama of Adrienne Kennedy." Barnett, Claudia.
Theatre Journal 48:2 (May 1996) pp.141-155.
LINKS TO INFORMATION
Biography
from a University of Michigan English class with photos
Biography
with a small bibliography
Adrienne
Kennedy Page from the University of Minnesota
A wonderful
page with critical
information
Page about
The Ohio State Murders with links to information about Kennedy (including
a link to this site)
RESOURCE CENTERS
The
Harry Ransom Humanities Center Adrienne Kennedy Papers
(text is from the finding aid)
"The papers of Adrienne Kennedy, ca. 1954-1992, document her evolution
from an aspiring writer to a successful playwright."
"All of Kennedy's plays are represented in this collection, from her
Obie Award winning FUNNYHOUSE OF A
NEGRO (1964) to her most recent production, OHIO STATE MURDERS
(1992). Additionally, manuscripts for
several unproduced or incomplete plays are present: "Letters,"
"Starring Galileo," "Film Festival," "Manhattan
Mystery Comedy," and an untitled play about George Jackson."
"The correspondence, 1963-1992, generally concerns Kennedy's career
as a playwright, writer, and educator,
though some correspondence is of a more personal nature. "
"Documentation of various productions of Ms. Kennedy's plays,
1963-1992, is also present in the form of
brochures, cast lists, clippings, contact lists, drawings, flyers,
musical scores, photographs, posters, programs,
publicity, rehearsal schedules, reviews, scripts, sound and video
recordings, tickets, etc."
La Mama
Scripts for early experimental pieces produced by La MaMa in the
1960's.
Hatch-Billops Collection, NY
Oral history audiotapes
Funnyhouse of a Negro
