Bonnie Greer,

OBE The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

FRSL The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, elec ...

(born 16 November 1948) is an American-British playwright, novelist, critic and broadcaster, who has lived in the UK since 1986. She has appeared as a panellist on television programmes such as '' Newsnight Review'' and ''

Question Time A question time in a parliament occurs when members of the parliament ask questions of government ministers (including the prime minister), which they are obliged to answer. It usually occurs daily while parliament is sitting, though it can be ca ...

'' and has served on the boards of several leading arts organisations, including the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docume ...

, the

Royal Opera House The Royal Opera House (ROH) is an opera house and major performing arts venue in Covent Garden, central London. The large building is often referred to as simply Covent Garden, after a previous use of the site. It is the home of The Royal ...

and the London Film School. She is Vice President of the Shaw Society. She is former Chancellor of

Kingston University , mottoeng = "Through Learning We Progress" , established = – gained University Status – Kingston Technical Institute , type = Public , endowment = £2.3 m (2015) , ...

Kingston upon Thames Kingston upon Thames (hyphenated until 1965, colloquially known as Kingston) is a town in the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames, southwest London, England. It is situated on the River Thames and southwest of Charing Cross. It is notable a ...

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. In July 2022 she was appointed a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820, by King George IV, to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 600 Fellows, ele ...

Life and career

Early life

Greer was born on the West Side of Chicago, the eldest of seven children born to Ben, a factory worker, and Willie Mae, a home maker. Greer's father was born to a family of

Mississippi Mississippi () is a state in the Southeastern region of the United States, bordered to the north by Tennessee; to the east by Alabama; to the south by the Gulf of Mexico; to the southwest by Louisiana; and to the northwest by Arkansas. Mis ...

sharecroppers Sharecropping is a legal arrangement with regard to agricultural land in which a landowner allows a tenant to use the land in return for a share of the crops produced on that land. Sharecropping has a long history and there are a wide range ...

. He was stationed in Britain during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

and took part in the D-Day landings. Although she began writing plays at the age of nine, Greer originally set out on a legal career, but dropped out when her professor told her he did not think women should have a career in law. Instead she studied theatre in Chicago under

David Mamet David Alan Mamet (; born November 30, 1947) is an American playwright, filmmaker, and author. He won a Pulitzer Prize and received Tony nominations for his plays ''Glengarry Glen Ross'' (1984) and '' Speed-the-Plow'' (1988). He first gained cri ...

's supervision and at the

Actors Studio The Actors Studio is a membership organization for professional actors, theatre directors and playwrights at 432 West 44th Street between Ninth and Tenth avenues in the Hell's Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan in New York City. It was founde ...

in New York with

Elia Kazan Elia Kazan (; born Elias Kazantzoglou ( el, Ηλίας Καζαντζόγλου); September 7, 1909 – September 28, 2003) was an American film and theatre director, producer, screenwriter and actor, described by ''The New York Times'' as "one o ...

. Living in Manhattan's

West Village The West Village is a neighborhood in the western section of the larger Greenwich Village neighborhood of Lower Manhattan, New York City. The traditional boundaries of the West Village are the Hudson River to the west, West 14th Street to t ...

(part of

Greenwich Village Greenwich Village ( , , ) is a neighborhood on the west side of Lower Manhattan in New York City, bounded by 14th Street to the north, Broadway to the east, Houston Street to the south, and the Hudson River to the west. Greenwich Village ...

) in New York City in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Greer had many gay male friends who became seriously ill.

Since 1986

Greer visited Scotland as part of a production at the

Edinburgh Festival __NOTOC__ This is a list of arts and cultural festivals regularly taking place in Edinburgh, Scotland. The city has become known for its festivals since the establishment in 1947 of the Edinburgh International Festival and the Edinburgh Fe ...

in 1986 and has been based in Britain since then. She told ''

The Sunday Times ''The Sunday Times'' is a British newspaper whose circulation makes it the largest in Britain's quality press market category. It was founded in 1821 as ''The New Observer''. It is published by Times Newspapers Ltd, a subsidiary of News UK, wh ...

'' in 2006 that she owes her life to the move. At the time, she made the decision to migrate to the UK because of her need to "escape the shadow of death" and the declining theatre scene in New York City. She acquired British citizenship in 1997. She has worked mainly in theatre with women and ethnic minorities, and is a former Arts Council playwright in residence at the

Soho Theatre The Soho Theatre is a theatre and registered charity in the Soho district of the City of Westminster, in London, England. It produces and presents new works of theatre, together with comedy and cabaret, across three performance spaces. The the ...

and for Nitro, previously known as the Black Theatre Co-operative and now called

NitroBeat Nitrobeat is a British theatre company, founded in 1979 as the Black Theatre Co-operative by the playwright Mustapha Matura Mustapha Matura (17 December 1939 – 29 October 2019) was a Trinidadian playwright living in London. Characterised by ...

. Greer has played

Joan of Arc Joan of Arc (french: link=yes, Jeanne d'Arc, translit= �an daʁk} ; 1412 – 30 May 1431) is a patron saint of France, honored as a defender of the French nation for her role in the siege of Orléans and her insistence on the corona ...

at the Theatre Atelier in Paris. She has written radio plays for

BBC Radio 3 BBC Radio 3 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC. It replaced the BBC Third Programme in 1967 and broadcasts classical music and opera, with jazz, world music, drama, culture and the arts also featuring. The st ...

and Radio 4, including a translation of '' The Little Prince''. Her plays include ''Munda Negra'' (1993), concerning the mental health problems of black women, ''Dancing on Blackwater'' (1994) and ''Jitterbug'' (2001), and the musicals ''Solid'' and ''Marilyn and Ella''. The latter work began as a radio play broadcast in December 2005 (''Marilyn and Ella Backstage at the Mocambo'') after Greer watched a documentary on

Marilyn Monroe Marilyn Monroe (; born Norma Jeane Mortenson; 1 June 1926 4 August 1962) was an American actress. Famous for playing comedic " blonde bombshell" characters, she became one of the most popular sex symbols of the 1950s and early 1960s, as wel ...

which mentioned Monroe's assistance to the jazz vocalist

Ella Fitzgerald Ella Jane Fitzgerald (April 25, 1917June 15, 1996) was an American jazz singer, sometimes referred to as the "First Lady of Song", "Queen of Jazz", and "Lady Ella". She was noted for her purity of tone, impeccable diction, phrasing, timing, i ...

as segregation prevented the singer from working at certain venues, especially the Mocambo nightclub. Adapted for the stage, Greer's radio play was given a production at the

Edinburgh Festival Fringe The Edinburgh Festival Fringe (also referred to as The Fringe, Edinburgh Fringe, or Edinburgh Fringe Festival) is the world's largest arts and media festival, which in 2019 spanned 25 days and featured more than 59,600 performances of 3,841 dif ...

in 2006 and was later rewritten and performed at the

Theatre Royal Stratford East The Theatre Royal Stratford East is a 460 seat Victorian producing theatre in Stratford in the London Borough of Newham. Since 1953, it has been the home of the Theatre Workshop company, famously associated with director Joan Littlewood, whos ...

in 2008. The play was produced at the

Apollo Theatre The Apollo Theatre is a Grade II listed West End theatre, on Shaftesbury Avenue in the City of Westminster, in central London.

, in London's West End, in November 2009. She is the author of two novels, ''Hanging by Her Teeth'' (1994) and ''Entropy'' (2009), and is working on a play for the National Theatre Studio. Greer was a regular contributor to

BBC Two BBC Two is a British free-to-air public broadcast television network owned and operated by the BBC. It covers a wide range of subject matter, with a remit "to broadcast programmes of depth and substance" in contrast to the more mainstream ...

's '' Newsnight Review'', and has been a panelist on the BBC's ''

'' programme. She appeared on the edition in October 2009 that also featured Nick Griffin, then leader of the

British National Party The British National Party (BNP) is a far-right, fascist political party in the United Kingdom. It is headquartered in Wigton, Cumbria, and its leader is Adam Walker. A minor party, it has no elected representatives at any level of UK go ...

. Commenting after the recording she called it "probably the weirdest and most creepy experience of my life". The encounter formed the basis for her opera, ''Yes'', written for the

with music by Errollyn Wallen, and which premiered there at the Linbury Studio Theatre in November 2011. She was formerly director of the Talawa Theatre Company and has served on the boards of the

and the London Film School. She is also a former theatre critic for ''

Time Out Time-out, Time Out, or timeout may refer to: Time * Time-out (sport), in various sports, a break in play, called by a team * Television timeout, a break in sporting action so that a commercial break may be taken * Timeout (computing), an enginee ...

'' magazine. Greer's book ''Obama Music'', partly a musical memoir, was published by Legend Press in October 2009. Reviewing it in ''

The Independent ''The Independent'' is a British online newspaper. It was established in 1986 as a national morning printed paper. Nicknamed the ''Indy'', it began as a broadsheet and changed to tabloid format in 2003. The last printed edition was publishe ...

'', Lesley McDowell said: "Greer expertly weaves in memories of her own upbringing in Chicago, with more humour than you might expect, along with a clear, defined passion for the music she grew up listening to. She wants to show, too, how both the place she lived in, and the songs she listened to, were full of unseen boundaries that had held people back – but also gave them something to fight against." Her biography of

Langston Hughes James Mercer Langston Hughes (February 1, 1901 – May 22, 1967) was an American poet, social activist, novelist, playwright, and columnist from Joplin, Missouri. One of the earliest innovators of the literary art form called jazz poetry, H ...

, ''Langston Hughes: The Value of Contradiction'', was published in 2011 (Arcadia/BlackAmber Inspirations). Greer co-produced a documentary film, ''Reflecting Skin'' (directed by

Mike Dibb Mike Dibb (born Wharfedale, Bradford, West Yorkshire, 29 April 1940) is an English documentary filmmaker. In almost half a century of making films mainly for television – on subjects including cinema, literature, art, jazz, sport and popular ...

) – on representations of black people in Western art – which was shown by the BBC in 2004. She is currently working on a novel about Rossetti. Greer's memoir ''A Parallel Life'' was published in 2014 and was described by Joy Lodico in ''The Independent'' as "the story of a journey deliberately and bravely taken against all expectations". Greer is a member of the Arts Emergency Service, a British charity working with 16- to 19-year-olds in further education from diverse backgrounds. She is a patron of the SI Leeds Literary Prize for unpublished fiction by Black and Asian women in the UK. She is also a board member of the

Authors' Licensing and Collecting Society The Authors' Licensing and Collecting Society (ALCS) is a British organisation that works to ensure that writers are fairly compensated for any of their works that are copied, broadcast or recorded. It has operated in the United Kingdom since 197 ...

(ALCS). In April 2005, she was appointed to the

's Board of Trustees and completed two full terms; from late March 2009 she served as Deputy Chairman. In 2011, she accepted the post of President of the Brontë Society. She resigned in June 2015, following internal disagreements about the society's direction. Greer is a contributor to the 2019 anthology '' New Daughters of Africa'', edited by Margaret Busby. Greer also appears in the

Sky Arts Sky Arts (originally launched as Artsworld) is a British free-to-air television channel offering 24 hours a day of programmes dedicated to highbrow arts, including theatrical performances, movies, documentaries and music (such as opera perfor ...

TV programme 'Discovering Film', as one of its leading movie experts celebrating the lives and work of some of the most prolific and iconic Hollywood stars, and comments frequently about members of the Royal Family on various

ITN Independent Television News (ITN) is a UK-based television production company. It is made up of two divisions: Broadcast News and ITN Productions. ITN is based in London, with bureaux and offices in Beijing, Brussels, Jerusalem, Johannesburg, N ...

documentaries such as Channel 4's ''Charles: Our New King''.

Honours and awards

Greer was appointed

Officer of the Order of the British Empire The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is a British order of chivalry, rewarding contributions to the arts and sciences, work with charitable and welfare organisations, and public service outside the civil service. It was established o ...

(OBE) in the 2010 Birthday Honours for services to the Arts. She received her honour from

Prince Charles Charles III (Charles Philip Arthur George; born 14 November 1948) is King of the United Kingdom and the 14 other Commonwealth realms. He was the longest-serving heir apparent and Prince of Wales and, at age 73, became the oldest person to ...

. In July 2022 she was appointed Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in London.

Selected works

Books

* ''Hanging by Her Teeth'' (Serpent's Tail, 1994), novel. * ''Entropy'' (Picnic Publishing, 2009), novel. * ''Obama Music'' ( Legend Press, 2009). * ''Langston Hughes: The Value of Contradiction'' (2011) (Arcadia/BlackAmber Books). * ''A Parallel Life'' (Arcadia Books, 2014).

Films

*''White Men Are Cracking Up'' (1996), screenplay)

Musicals

*''Solid'' *''

Marilyn and Ella ''Marilyn and Ella'' is a 2008 play by Bonnie Greer. It is a musical drama about Marilyn Monroe and Ella Fitzgerald. Background On March 15, 1955 Ella Fitzgerald opened her initial engagement at the Mocambo nightclub in Hollywood, after Marilyn ...

'' (2008)

Opera

*''Yes'' (November 2011), Royal Opera House, Covent Garden

Plays

*''Munda Negra'' (1993)Bonnie Greer
at Doollee.com *''Dancing on Blackwater'' (1994) *''Jitterbug'' ( Arcola Theatre, 2001)

Podcasts

Radio plays

*''The Little Prince'' *'' Marilyn and Ella Backstage at the Mocambo'' *''Ferguson'' (2016)

TV

*''Siren Spirits'', Episode 4 (1994)"'Siren Spirits' White Men Are Cracking Up (1994)"
IMDb.

References

External links

Greer's contributor page
at ''The Guardian''.
Contributor page
at the ''New Statesman''.
"Abstraction of Wit in Black Heritage and Modern Times"
9 February 2010, ''Insights'' Public Lecture, University of Newcastle

Lecture video recording, 2 hrs.]
"Marilyn, Ella ... & Bonnie – Newsnight's kindest critic brings the strange-but-true tale of two icons to Edinburgh"
''Sunday Herald'', 6 August 2006. {{DEFAULTSORT:Greer, Bonnie 1948 births Living people 20th-century American women writers African-American dramatists and playwrights American emigrants to the United Kingdom American women dramatists and playwrights British dramatists and playwrights Black British television personalities Black British women writers Naturalised citizens of the United Kingdom Officers of the Order of the British Empire Trustees of the British Museum English people of African-American descent African-American women writers People from Greenwich Village 20th-century African-American women Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature