Pearl Cleage (Playwright) – is an Atlanta-based playwright currently serving as Distinguished Artist in Residence at The Alliance Theatre. The recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Dramatists Guild, she is also Atlanta’s first Poet Laureate. Her plays include Flyin’ West, Blues for an Alabama Sky, The Nacirema Society…, What I Learned in Paris, and Angry, Raucous and Shamelessly Gorgeous. Her work is anthologized in Flyin’ West and Other Plays, published by Theatre Communications Group. In addition to the Alliance, Cleage has been widely produced, including performances at the Goodman Theatre, London’s National Theatre, the McCarter Theatre Center, Penumbra Theatre, Keen Company, Ford’s Theatre, the Huntington Theatre Company, the Guthrie Theater, Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre, Actor’s Express, the Black Repertory Company, the Old Globe, the Negro Ensemble Company, Arena Stage, Alabama Shakespeare Festival, the Ensemble Theatre, New Federal Theatre, and Actors Theatre of Louisville. Her work is widely taught and produced at colleges and universities across the country. She is also a performance artist working in collaboration with her husband, writer Zaron W. Burnett, Jr. Their groundbreaking performance work is the subject of a new documentary film Live at Club Zebra! directed by Matthew and David Adeboye. Cleage and Burnett also collaborated on In My Granny’s Garden, a book for young children, which was adapted for the stage by Rosemary Newcott and has been performed in Atlanta, Chicago, and St. Louis. The author of eight novels, including What Looks Like Crazy on an Ordinary Day, a New York Times bestseller, Cleage also co-authored with Burnett “We Speak Your Names,” a praise poem commissioned by Oprah Winfrey. She is currently at work on Off Day at Chickens, in collaboration with Burnett and a play with music, Letters from Aunt Nina, based on the music and memories of Simone’s niece, actor/singer Crystal Fox.