Idris Goodwin is a North American

playwright A playwright or dramatist is a person who writes plays. Etymology The word "play" is from Middle English pleye, from Old English plæġ, pleġa, plæġa ("play, exercise; sport, game; drama, applause"). The word "wright" is an archaic English ...

rapper Rapping (also rhyming, spitting, emceeing or MCing) is a musical form of vocal delivery that incorporates "rhyme, rhythmic speech, and street vernacular". It is performed or chanted, usually over a backing beat or musical accompaniment. The ...

, essayist, and poet. In July 2022, Idris Goodwin became the third Artistic Director of Seattle Children's Theatre.

Early life

Idris Goodwin was born in Detroit, Michigan. He earned a Bachelor of Arts in Film, Video, and Screenwriting at

Columbia College Chicago Columbia College Chicago is a private art college in Chicago, Illinois. Founded in 1890, it has 5,928https://about.colum.edu/effectiveness/pdf/spring-2021-student-profile.pdf students pursuing degrees in more than 60 undergraduate and graduat ...

. Goodwin received his Master of Fine Arts in Creative Writing at the

School of the Art Institute of Chicago The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC) is a private art school associated with the Art Institute of Chicago (AIC) in Chicago, Illinois. Tracing its history to an art students' cooperative founded in 1866, which grew into the museum an ...

. He did graduate work at the

University of Iowa The University of Iowa (UI, U of I, UIowa, or simply Iowa) is a public research university in Iowa City, Iowa, United States. Founded in 1847, it is the oldest and largest university in the state. The University of Iowa is organized into 12 coll ...

Playwrights Workshop.

Career

The first play Goodwin ever wrote was titled ''Braising'' in 2001, and was performed in the back of a coffee shop. Goodwin recalls that the play was "thrown together and done on a budget… and miraculously we got a great review."Brown, Joel
“Idris Goodwin, playwright with an ear to the streets”
"Boston Globe", July 20, 2013. Since then he has written and had several successful plays produced such as ''And in This Corner… Cassius Clay'' (2016), which received the 2017 Distinguished Play Award from The American Association of Theater and Education ''And in'' ''This Corner... Cassius Clay'' (2016) was commissioned by Stage One Family Theater in

Louisville, Kentucky Louisville ( , , ) is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the 28th most-populous city in the United States. Louisville is the historical seat and, since 2003, the nominal seat of Jefferson County, on the Indiana borde ...

, in partnership with the Muhammad Ali Center. During Metro Theater Company's follow up production, they initiated The Cassius Project, which included a website with details of Ali's life, juxtaposing it with major points of the civil rights movement. ''How We Got On'' (2013), was developed at the Eugene O'Neill Playwriting Conference and premiered in the Actors Theater's 2012 Humana Festival and was also nominated for an ATCA Steinberg New Play Award. Goodwin has earned awards from the Hip Hop Theater festival, The Illinois Arts Council, the

National Endowment for the Arts The National Endowment for the Arts (NEA) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that offers support and funding for projects exhibiting artistic excellence. It was created in 1965 as an independent agency of the federa ...

, the

Ford Foundation The Ford Foundation is an American private foundation with the stated goal of advancing human welfare. Created in 1936 by Edsel Ford and his father Henry Ford, it was originally funded by a US$25,000 gift from Edsel Ford. By 1947, after the dea ...

, the

Mellon Foundation The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation of New York City in the United States, simply known as Mellon Foundation, is a private foundation with five core areas of interest, and endowed with wealth accumulated by Andrew Mellon of the Mellon family of Pitt ...

, and the

Edgerton Foundation Edgerton may refer to: Places In Canada: * Edgerton, Alberta In the United Kingdom: *Edgerton, Huddersfield, West Yorkshire In the United States: *Edgerton, Indiana *Edgerton, Kansas *Edgerton, Minnesota * Edgerton, Missouri *Edgerton, Ohio *Edge ...

. In 2017, Goodwin won the Blue Ink Playwriting Award for ''HYPE MAN:a break beat play''. The play takes place in wake of a controversial police shooting and it was selected as the winner in a pool of 543 submissions. ''HYPE MAN'' received its world premiere at Company One in 2018. It won the

Elliot Norton Award The Elliot Norton Awards are presented annually to honor the best achievements in Boston-area theater. The genesis of the awards was the Norton Medal, which was first awarded in 1983 and was named after long-time theater critic Elliot Norton (1903 ...

for Best New Play that same year. Numerous theatres across the country produced Hype Man through 2018 and 2019 including,

The Flea Theater The Flea Theater, founded in 1996, is a theater in the TriBeCa section of New York City. It presents primarily new American theater and provides a venue for film stars to act on a very small (74-seat) stage, as well as a smaller black box theat ...

and

The Fountain Theatre The Fountain Theatre is a theatre in Los Angeles. Along with its programming of live theatre, it's also the foremost producer of flamenco on the West Coast. History The Fountain Theatre was founded in Los Angeles in 1990 by co-artistic direc ...

. Goodwin lectures at colleges, high schools/middle schools, and other venues all throughout the United States. He also credits playwright

Lorraine Hansberry Lorraine Vivian Hansberry (May 19, 1930 – January 12, 1965) was a playwright and writer. She was the first African-American female author to have a play performed on Broadway. Her best-known work, the play ''A Raisin in the Sun'', highlig ...

, playwright

August Wilson August Wilson ( Frederick August Kittel Jr.; April 27, 1945 – October 2, 2005) was an American playwright. He has been referred to as the "theater's poet of Black America". He is best known for a series of ten plays, collectively called ' (or ...

, and

Chuck D Carlton Douglas Ridenhour (born August 1, 1960), known professionally as Chuck D, is an American rapper, best known as the leader and frontman of the hip hop group Public Enemy, which he co-founded in 1985 with Flavor Flav. Chuck D helped crea ...

Public Enemy "Public enemy" is a term which was first widely used in the United States in the 1930s to describe individuals whose activities were seen as criminal and extremely damaging to society, though the phrase had been used for centuries to describe ...

as inspirations for his work. Goodwin has been featured on

Def Poetry Jam ''Russell Simmons presents Def Poetry'', better known as simply ''Def Poetry Jam'' or ''Def Poetry'', is a spoken word poetry television series hosted by Mos Def and airing on HBO between 2002 and 2007. The series features performances by estab ...

, and was part of the cast on the documentary film ''What's On Your Plate'' (2009), a narrative about two eleven-year-old African-American exploring their place in society. He also performed on

PBS The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of ed ...

’s ''Sesame Street'', and for

National Public Radio National Public Radio (NPR, stylized in all lowercase) is an American privately and state funded nonprofit media organization headquartered in Washington, D.C., with its NPR West headquarters in Culver City, California. It differs from othe ...

. He is also featured in the 2010 Youth Poetry documentary ''Louder Than a Bomb''. Write Bloody Books published "These are the Breaks" Goodwin's collection of essays and poems in 2011. The collection of essays was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in the same year. It was in this book, along with his 2010 album ''Break Beat Poems'' that Goodwin coined the term Break Beat Poetry. In May 2020, Idris Goodwin became the Director of the

Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center The Colorado Springs Fine Arts Center at Colorado College (FAC) is an arts center located just north of downtown Colorado Springs, Colorado. Located on the same city block are the American Numismatic Association and part of the campus of Colorado ...

Colorado College Colorado College is a private college, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Colorado Springs, Colorado. It was founded in 1874 by Thomas Nelson Haskell in his daughter's memory. The college enrolls approxi ...

He currently serves as the Artistic Director of Seattle Children's Theater Idris is a 2021 United States Artist Fellow.

Plays

*''Braising'' – 2001 *''How We Got On (the first break beat play)'' – 2012 *''Blackademics'' – 2012 *''Bars and Measures''- 2014 *''The Raid'' – 2015 *''This is Modern Art'' (based on true events) – 2015 *''And in This Corner...Cassius Clay'' −2016 *''The Realness: a break beat play''-2016 *''HYPE MAN: a break beat play'' – 2017 *''The Way the Mountain Moved'' – 2018 *''Frankenstein'' – 2018 *''Ghost (based upon the novel by

Jason Reynolds Jason Reynolds (born December 6, 1983) is an American author of novels and poetry for young adult and middle-grade audience. Born in Washington, D.C. and raised in neighboring Oxon Hill, Maryland, Reynolds found inspiration in rap and had an ea ...

)'' – 2019 *''The Boy Who Kissed the Sky'' – 2022

Albums

*''Break Beat Poems'' −2010 *''Break Beat Bars'' −2011 *''Rhyming While Black'' −2014

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Goodwin, Idris Living people American male essayists American male poets American male rappers American dramatists and playwrights Colorado College faculty Columbia College Chicago alumni School of the Art Institute of Chicago alumni Year of birth missing (living people)