Robert O'Hara
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Robert O'Hara (born 1970) is an American playwright and director. He has written ''Insurrection: Holding History'' and ''Bootycandy''. ''Insurrection'' is a time traveling play exploring racial and sexual identity. ''Bootycandy'' is a series of comedic scenes primarily following the character of Sutter, a gay African American man growing from adolescence to manhood. It won the Lambda Literary Award for LGBT Drama. O’Hara was nominated for the 2020
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ce ...
for Best Direction of a Play for his contribution to
Slave Play ''Slave Play'' is a three-act play by Jeremy O. Harris about race, sex, power relations, trauma, and interracial relationships.Lapacazo Sandoval, Contributing Writer. Slave Play' by Jeremy O. Harris a Real Look at Racism in America —Opening o ...
.


Early life and education

O'Hara was born in
Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati ( ; colloquially nicknamed Cincy) is a city in Hamilton County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. Settled in 1788, the city is located on the northern side of the confluence of the Licking River (Kentucky), Licking and Ohio Ri ...
. Growing up, he lived with his mother, who had him when she was seventeen, and his step-father, who moved in when O'Hara was twelve. In the third grade, he began attending Catholic school, where he found himself one of the few African-American students there. He attended Walnut Hills High School, a nationally recognized public academic magnet school in Cincinnati, where he was active in the theater program. He later attended
Tufts University Tufts University is a private research university in Medford and Somerville, Massachusetts, United States, with additional facilities in Boston and Grafton, as well as Talloires, France. Tufts also has several Doctor of Physical Therapy p ...
in
Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
, and graduated in 1992. Initially he came to the school major in
political science Political science is the scientific study of politics. It is a social science dealing with systems of governance and Power (social and political), power, and the analysis of political activities, political philosophy, political thought, polit ...
and become a lawyer. However, he quickly realized he was much more interested in
theatre Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors to present experiences of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a Stage (theatre), stage. The performe ...
, and changed his major to drama. At Tufts he started the Tufts Black Theatre Company, for which he directed and wrote work. After graduating from Tufts, he then went on to pursue a master's degree in directing at
Columbia University Columbia University in the City of New York, commonly referred to as Columbia University, is a Private university, private Ivy League research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Churc ...
, which he completed in 1996. During his time at Columbia, O'Hara interned at the
Manhattan Theatre Club Manhattan Theatre Club (MTC) is a theatre company located in New York City, affiliated with the League of Resident Theatres. Lynne Meadow has been the company’s Artistic Director and visionary since 1972. Barry Grove joined the company in 19 ...
and the
Joseph Papp Public Theater The Public Theater is an arts organization in New York City. Founded by Joseph Papp, The Public Theater was originally the Shakespeare Workshop in 1954; its mission was to support emerging playwrights and performers.Epstein, Helen. ''Joe Papp: A ...
, where he was mentored by notable African-American playwright George C. Wolfe, author of The Colored Museum.


Career


Theatre

O'Hara is known throughout the theatre world for his career as a playwright and director. In 2011 he became a company member at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington, D.C. In 2013, O'Hara was one of 14 people awarded a playwright residency grant from the
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, commonly known as the Mellon Foundation, is a New York City-based private foundation with wealth accumulated by Andrew Mellon of the Mellon family of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It is the product of the 1969 merger ...
, and was Woolly Mammoth's playwright in residence from 2013 to 2015. In October 2020, O’Hara was nominated for a
Tony Award The Antoinette Perry Award for Excellence in Broadway Theatre, more commonly known as a Tony Award, recognizes excellence in live Broadway theatre. The awards are presented by the American Theatre Wing and The Broadway League at an annual ce ...
for Best Direction of a Play for his direction of ''
Slave Play ''Slave Play'' is a three-act play by Jeremy O. Harris about race, sex, power relations, trauma, and interracial relationships.Lapacazo Sandoval, Contributing Writer. Slave Play' by Jeremy O. Harris a Real Look at Racism in America —Opening o ...
.'' O'Hara was featured in the 2022 book ''50 Key Figures in Queer US Theatre'', with a profile written by theatre scholar Faedra Chatard Carpenter.


Film

In the mid-nineties, O'Hara wrote the script to a
Richard Pryor Richard Franklin Lennox Thomas Pryor Sr. (December 1, 1940 – December 10, 2005) was an American stand-up comedian and actor. Known for reaching a broad audience with his trenchant observations and storytelling style, he is widely regarded ...
biopic called ''Live'' that was to be directed by
Martin Scorsese Martin Charles Scorsese ( , ; born November17, 1942) is an American filmmaker. One of the major figures of the New Hollywood era, he has received List of awards and nominations received by Martin Scorsese, many accolades, including an Academ ...
. However, the project remained trapped in development and has yet to be made. O'Hara also wrote the script to ''Micheaux,'' a biopic following the life of African-American filmmaker
Oscar Micheaux Oscar Devereaux Micheaux (; January 2, 1884 – March 25, 1951) was an American author, film director and independent producer of more than 44 films. Although the short-lived Lincoln Motion Picture Company was the first movie company owned and c ...
that was to be directed by
Spike Lee Shelton Jackson "Spike" Lee (born March 20, 1957) is an American film director, producer, screenwriter, actor, and author. His work has continually explored race relations, issues within the black community, the role of media in contemporary ...
. In 2011, O'Hara made his film directing debut with the Horror/Thriller film ''The Inheritance'', which he also wrote. The film follows the story of a group of cousins who meet to receive their ancestors inheritance, but discover a deadly secret instead.


Notable works


''Insurrection: Holding History''

''Insurrection: Holding History'' follows the story of a young, gay African-American man named Ron, who travels back in time with his 189-year-old grandfather to the time of the
Nat Turner's Rebellion Nat Turner's Rebellion, historically known as the Southampton Insurrection, was a slave rebellion that took place in Southampton County, Virginia, in August 1831. Led by Nat Turner, the rebels, made up of enslaved African Americans, killed b ...
. The play deals with themes of racial identity and sexuality, as Ron comes to face his ancestors' history, and his own personal identity. ''Insurrection'' was written during O'Hara's time interning at the Public Theatre. It was selected as a part of the 1995 new work reading series at the
Mark Taper Forum The Mark Taper Forum is a 739-seat thrust stage at the Los Angeles Music Center designed by Welton Becket and Associates on the Bunker Hill section of downtown Los Angeles. Named for real estate developer Mark Taper, the Forum, the neighborin ...
, and O'Hara later directed it as a part of his Master's thesis at Columbia in April of that year. His student production of the play garnered much attention, and helped to get O'Hara's work noticed by the New York theatre community. In 1996, the play won ''Newsday's'' Oppenheimer Award for Best New American Play. The play officially opened at the Public Theatre on October 11, 1996, and was produced by O'Hara's former mentor George C. Wolfe.


''Brave Blood''

''Brave Blood'' takes place in the home of Ms. Anne, a psychiatrist who takes in a group of female prostitutes in order to help better their lives. However, when a murder occurs, the investigation throws the house into chaos. The play deals with themes of how exploitation affects identity. O'Hara directed the play's premiere in 2001 at the Transparent Theatre Company in
Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Anglo-Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland, Cali ...
.


''-14: An American Maul''

''-14: An American Maul'' takes place in a future America where a new form of cotton is created that requires manual labor to be grown and picked. As a result, the President repeals the Fourteenth Amendment, and effectively reinstates slavery. The play was produced during O'Hara's residence at the
American Conservatory Theater The American Conservatory Theater (ACT) is a nonprofit theater company in San Francisco, California, United States, that offers both classical and contemporary theater productions. It also has an attached acting school. History The American ...
.


''Antebellum''

''Antebellum'' focuses on themes of social injustice as it intercuts between two alternate stories throughout the play: one which takes place in Atlanta in 1939, the other in Germany in 1936. The Atlanta plot-line centers on a young Jewish couple living in the South who dress up in Civil War era attire to attend the premiere of ''Gone with the Wind''. In Berlin, a Third Reich officer at a Nazi death camp is in love with his prisoner, a black, male cabaret performer, yet still allows him to be tortured. The play premiered at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre in
Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...
, on March 30, 2009.


''The Etiquette of Vigilance''

''The Etiquette of Vigilance'' is a contemporary re-imagining of
Lorraine Hansberry Lorraine Vivian Hansberry (May 19, 1930 – January 12, 1965) was an American playwright and writer. She was the first African-American female author to have a play performed on Broadway theatre, Broadway. Her best-known work, the play ''A Raisin ...
's 1959 play
A Raisin in the Sun ''A Raisin in the Sun'' is a play by Lorraine Hansberry that debuted on Broadway in 1959. The title comes from the poem "Harlem" (also known as "A Dream Deferred") by Langston Hughes. The story tells of a black family's experiences in south Ch ...
. It follows the story of Travis, the youngest male of the Younger family original play, and his daughter Lorraine, who is about to become the first of her family to enter college, and feels the pressure of her family's longheld desire to achieve the American Dream. The play premiere at the
Steppenwolf Theatre Steppenwolf Theatre Company is a Chicago theater company founded in 1974 by Terry Kinney, Jeff Perry, and Gary Sinise in the Immaculate Conception grade school in Highland Park, Illinois and is now located in Chicago's Lincoln Park neighbo ...
in Chicago on October 22, 2010.


''Bootycandy''

''BootyCandy'' is a series of interconnected vignettes, often comedic and satirical, that explore themes of what it means to be a black gay man in America. Originally written as twelve separate short plays, O'Hara eventually wove them together into one play, bringing the character of Sutter out as the through line through most of the smaller scenes. O'Hara has said that while the play is in many ways autobiographical and the character of Sutter particularly mirrors his own experiences, it doesn't necessarily tell the exact story of his own life. The play premiered at the Woolly Mammoth Theatre in Washington, D.C., on May 30, 2011. It then moved to Playwrights Horizons Theater Company from August 22 through October 19, 2014. Here, it won the
Obie Award The Obie Awards or Off-Broadway Theater Awards are annual awards given since 1956 by ''The Village Voice'' newspaper to theater artists and groups involved in off-Broadway and off-off-Broadway productions in New York City. Starting just after th ...
's Special Citation shared between O'Hara and actors Philip James Brannon, Jessica Frances Dukes, Jesse Pennington, Benja Kay Thomas, and Lance Coadie Williams. Two of the vignettes from ''BootyCandy'' - ''Dreaming in Church'' and ''Genitalia'' were developed and produced by Worth Street Theater Company at The Tribeca Playhouse as part of their''Snapshots 2000'' series. Worth Street's artistic director Jeff Cohen was the director. Bruce Weber of The New York Times wrote: “''Dreamin’ In Church'' is a comic monologue delivered from the pulpit of a black church. (It is) a carefully constructed piece with a warning against rumormongering – there are gays in the church choir, it is said – and mounts to its own joyous confession. Mr. O’Hara, who is black, is a promising and energetic playwright with a healthy sense of the comic possibilities of bigotry and racial stereotypes. He has a second offering here as well, a jokey skit in Wayans brothers’ mode about black women talking on the phone about the decision by one of them to name her baby ''Genitalia.'' In ''”Dreamin"'' Mr. O’Hara shows off a gift for deft pacing, withholding the comic underpinnings of the story just long enough. Performed by Derek Lively with fervent, singsong mischief the monologue ends up thundering on some obvious points and once Mr. Lively strips off his robe to disclose his own secret his delivery is hilarious.”


''Barbecue''

''Barbecue'' centers on around the O'Mallerys, a dysfunctional group of siblings who come together for a park barbeque in order to stage an emergency intervention for their sister Barbara, whose drug habit has gotten out of hand. However, there are in fact two O'Mallery families, one white and one black. Each appear in different, yet similar scenes that juxtapose to create a dialogue about racial and family politics. The play premiered at the Public Theatre in New York, NY on September 22, 2015. Barbecue was produced by Intiman Theatre at the Langston Hughes Performing Arts Institute, Seattle WA in June 2017.


Critical reception

O'Hara's work has often received polarized reviews from critics; he is often praised for his bold and daring themes, yet criticized in the execution of them. Considering his first play ''Insurrection,
Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'' critic Greg Evans found O'Hara's work to be "a fanciful study in Black history that announc dO'Hara as a promising new voice," yet only "partially successful" in performance. ''New York Times'' theatre critic Peter Marks had a similar reaction in his review as he stated the play was "clever" yet "all over" the map. Both reviews criticized O'Hara's choice to act as his own director, which he continues to do for many of his plays. Marks also reviewed O'Hara's play ''Antebellum'' in 2009, and felt that while the show had a "rich, imaginatively expressive intelligence," overall it was "overthought" and "garish." News Herald reporter Bob Abelman had a similar take on the show, which he found to be a "brilliant concept" but "by the end of the night is gone with the wind." In contrast, O'Hara's play ''Bootycandy'' received a wide variety of positive reviews. New York Times theatre critic
Charles Isherwood Charles Splaine Isherwood Jr. (born October 1964) is an American theater critic. Career A graduate of Stanford University, Isherwood wrote for '' Backstage West'' in Los Angeles. In 1993, he joined the staff of '' Variety'', where he was promote ...
named it a "Critic's Pick" at the time of its New York premiere, and described it to be "as raw in its language and raucous in spirit as it is smart and provocative." Isherwood also praised O'Hara's ability to alternate between moments of comedy and drama as he stated that "as funny as he can be when writing in ribald ′In Living Color′ sketch-comedy mode, Mr. O’Hara also reveals a more probing intelligence in the more serious scenes" of the play. LA Times theatre critic
Charles McNulty Charles McNulty (born 1966) is the chief theatre critic for the ''Los Angeles Times'' newspaper and a recipient of Cornell University's prestigious Nathan Award for dramatic criticism, who, himself, served as chairman of the Pulitzer Prize dra ...
praised O'Hara for "grappl ngwith the conflicts and contradictions inherent in being a member of more than one oppressed group" and "tackling the challenge of writing about this experience in a culture that expects its minority playwrights to follow paths prescribed by white institutions" within his work.


Personal life

He is openly gay.


Awards


References


External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Ohara, Robert 1970s births 20th-century American dramatists and playwrights 20th-century American male writers 21st-century American dramatists and playwrights 21st-century American male writers African-American dramatists and playwrights American male dramatists and playwrights American theatre directors Columbia University School of the Arts alumni American gay writers African-American LGBTQ people American LGBTQ dramatists and playwrights LGBTQ people from Ohio Lambda Literary Award for Drama winners Living people Tufts University School of Arts and Sciences alumni Writers from Cincinnati Year of birth missing (living people) 20th-century African-American writers 21st-century African-American writers African-American male writers