Angelo Parra is an American playwright

Playwright

A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...

. He was born in Manhattan

Manhattan

Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...

 and grew up in the Bronx

The Bronx

The Bronx is the northernmost of the five boroughs of New York City. It is also known as Bronx County, the last of the 62 counties of New York State to be incorporated...

, New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

. After graduating from Fordham University

Fordham University

Fordham University is a private, nonprofit, coeducational research university in the United States, with three campuses in and around New York City. It was founded by the Roman Catholic Diocese of New York in 1841 as St...

, his career included work as a reporter/photographer, public relations professional, politician, free-lance writer, and PR and journalism teacher at New York University before turning to theatre in 1986. His first produced play, Casino, was presented at T. Schreiber Studio, and won a 1989 New York Foundation for the Arts

New York Foundation for the Arts

The New York Foundation for the Arts was created in conjunction the in 1971. The organization gives grants to individual artists and writers and developing arts organizations with a mission to '.'-NYFA's Programs:...

 (NYFA) Fellowship in Playwriting and an Arts International grant (sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts, U.S. Information Agency, Rockefeller Foundation, and The Pew Charitable Trusts

The Pew Charitable Trusts

The Pew Charitable Trusts is an independent non-profit, non-governmental organization , founded in 1948. With over US$5 billion in assets, its current mission is to serve the public interest by "improving public policy, informing the public, and stimulating civic life."-History:The Trusts, a single...

).

His work, The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith, with music on the life of Bessie Smith

Bessie Smith

Bessie Smith was an American blues singer.Sometimes referred to as The Empress of the Blues, Smith was the most popular female blues singer of the 1920s and 1930s...

, was named "one of the top-10 Off-Broadway experiences of 2001" by the New York Daily News

New York Daily News

The Daily News of New York City is the fourth most widely circulated daily newspaper in the United States with a daily circulation of 605,677, as of November 1, 2011....

, "Best Solo Show" by Florida's Broward/Palm Beach New Times, and won a second NYFA Playwriting Fellowship (2000). The show was conceived by and originally directed by Joe Brancato and originally staged by Penguin Rep Theatre, Stony Point, New York.

Parra has production credits in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Washington, D.C.; at Florida Stage (Palm Beach), The Hartford Stage (Hartford, Connecticut), Theatre Memphis, at the Cape Playhouse (Cape Cod); and, at the Edinburgh International Festival

Edinburgh International Festival

The Edinburgh International Festival is a festival of performing arts that takes place in the city of Edinburgh, Scotland, over three weeks from around the middle of August. By invitation from the Festival Director, the International Festival brings top class performers of music , theatre, opera...

. Parra also is the author of "Playwriting for Dummies," part of the popular international series of how-to books.

Among Parra's other prize-winning plays is the hospital drama, Journey of the Heart (formerly titled A Heart of Flesh), winner of the Jewel Box Theatre, Mixed Blood Theatre, and David James Ellis national play awards in 1998. Also in 1998, Song of the Coquí, his Hispanic family drama with humor and dance, won the Chicano/Latino Literary Award (University of California, Irvine) and an "American Dream" prize by Repertorio Español in New York City.

Parra is a member of the BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop

BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theater Workshop

The BMI Lehman Engel Musical Theatre Workshop is a workshop in New York for musical theatre composers, lyricists and librettists.-History:The BMI Workshop was founded in 1961 by Lehman Engel and the performing rights organization BMI ....

 and The Dramatists Guild. He was a Tennessee Williams Scholar at the 2000 Sewanee Writers Conference, teaches playwriting, performing arts, and English at SUNY Rockland Community College

Rockland Community College

Rockland Community College is a two-year college in the State University of New York system, located in hamlet of Viola within the Village of Suffern from the Town of Ramapo in Rockland County, New York. The college began in 1959 in the former county almshouse. The college offers 48 programs and...

. In addition to his BA in Communication Arts at Fordham, he earned an MA in Political Science at the New School in New York, and MFA in Playwriting at Brooklyn College. He is currently president of the Penguin Repertory Company Board of Trustees (www.penguinrep.org).

Along with the children's musicals Percy T. Penguin Comes to America and Anansi the Spider Learns his Lesson, Parra's other plays include:

• Canvases
• The Price of Honor
• Prickasaurus
• The Slope
• Warmflesch
• A Waltz Withoutc Turns
• Midnight Kiss
• What is it With Me?