The Life & Legacy of August Wilson

by Moira O'Sullivan

August Wilson, originally named Frederick August Kittel, Jr., was born on April 27, 1945, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Widely known for his Pulitzer Prize–winning plays Fences and The Piano Lesson (a revival of which just closed on Broadway starring Samuel L. Jackson, John David Washington, and Danielle Brooks), Wilson wrote about Black American life throughout the 20th century and put working-class Pittsburghers center stage.

While we now know him as a prolific playwright, Wilson began his artistic career as a poet. He was never formally trained in his craft—in fact, he dropped out of high school at the age of 15, after experiencing overwhelming racism and ostracization by his classmates. His curiosity was not nearly quelled though, and he turned to his local library to continue his education on his own terms. Wilson struggled with the complexity of race growing up; his mother was Black and his father was White, and Wilson was raised solely by his mother in the predominantly Black neighborhood of the Hill District.

She married a Black man and moved the family to a predominantly White suburb when he was 13. Once Wilson was on his own, he returned to the Hill District to explore his identity, his community, and his culture. This would serve as the backdrop for most of his plays.

Wilson became extremely involved in the Black Power movement, and social justice became a key focus of his poetry, published in such journals as Black World (1971) and Black Lines (1972). He co-founded Black Horizons Theater, which operated out of community centers and school auditoriums, and produced plays about the Black experience, making them affordable and available to his Hill District neighbors. It was there that Wilson fell into directing, mounting plays by one of his inspirations, political playwright Amiri Baraka. When no one else was up for the job, Wilson volunteered and headed to the library, where he found a how-to book on directing and figured it out on his feet. From there, he started writing for the stage, and the discovery of this new medium changed the trajectory of his career forever.

In 1978, Wilson left Pittsburgh for St. Paul, Minnesota, where he lived and worked through the 1980s writing the series of plays that we now call The American Century Cycle. Nine out of the ten plays in the series were set in Pittsburgh (the exception being Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, which takes place in Chicago) and told stories about the Black community in several different decades. His first play, Jitney (1979), earned him a fellowship at the Minneapolis Playwright Center, and was followed by Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (1980), which was developed at the National Playwrights Conference. From there, he premiered Fences on Broadway in 1987, which won Wilson his first Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award. Joe Turner’s Come and Gone opened on Broadway in 1988, followed by The Piano Lesson in 1990, earning him his second Pulitzer Prize. His Broadway legacy is remarkable, with his plays appearing on stages for the next three decades: Two Trains Running (1992), Seven Guitars (1996), King Hedley II (2001), Gem of the Ocean (2004), and several revivals since.

Wilson was celebrated throughout his career, winning seven New York Drama Critics’ Circle Awards for Best Play and receiving Guggenheim and Rockefeller fellowships.

In 2003, he shared his own artistic journey in his solo show How I Learned What I Learned at Seattle Rep, directed by collaborator Todd Kreidler.

August Wilson died of liver cancer on October 2, 2005, at the age of 60 after opening his final play, Radio Golf, in Los Angeles a few months earlier. He left behind daughters Sakina Wilson, from his first marriage to Brenda Burton, and Azula Wilson, his daughter with his third wife, costume designer Constanza Romero, who has since been in charge of his artistic estate. His hometown of Pittsburgh opened the August Wilson Center for African American Culture in 2009, and his plays continue to reach new audiences on Broadway and regional theaters across the globe. Actor and producer Denzel Washington is such a big fan of Wilson’s writing that he made a deal with HBO to make film adaptations of the entire American Century Cycle. So far, he has released Fences (2016) and Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (2020) to critical acclaim and multiple Oscar nominations (Fences with four nominations and one win, Ma Rainey with five nominations and two wins). Washington said in a statement, “August Wilson is one of the greatest playwrights in American history, in world history. It is a privilege and honor, responsibility and duty, and a joy to be a small part in keeping him alive.” Wilson’s legacy continues to empower and inspire audiences through his writing’s deep understanding of humanity and it will live on in every adaptation or production that appears on screens and stages alike.