Playwright’s Perspective
an interview with Aleshea Harris originally published at The Royal Court
Aleshea Harris is a playwright, screenwriter, and performer. Her play Is God Is makes its Houston debut at
Rec Room and has won the 2016 Relentless Award, an OBIE Award for playwriting in 2017, the Helen Merrill Playwriting Award in 2019 and was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. Aleshea was awarded a Windham-Campbell Literary Prize and the Mimi Steinberg Playwriting Award in 2020 and the Hermitage Greenfield Prize in 2021. She has performed her own work at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Orlando Fringe Festival, REDCAT, as part of La Fête du Livre at La Comèdie de Saint-Étienne and at the Skirball Center in Los Angeles. Harris is a two-time MacDowell Fellow and has enjoyed residencies at Hedgebrook and Djerassi. What inspired you to write Is God Is? I wanted to write an epic that felt both old and new. I can recall asking myself what a play that took its cues from ancient Greek tragedy might feel like occupied by characters who felt familiar to my cultural context. That was a rich source of inspiration. I also had a strong desire to talk back to cultural pressure for Black women to behave themselves in particular ways. I’m troubled by notions that we gain respect because of our ability to
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endure the many insidious manifestations of misogynoir. I wanted to write Black women who fought for themselves and each other and I wanted it to be loads of fun. Is God Is is me going scorched earth on respectability politics. They cannot save us. They will not save us. I was also excited to create a story which subverts cultural thirst for Black narrative that centres anti-Blackness as its main concern.
