FPP Harlem spoke with acclaimed playwright and screenwriter Bathsheba Doran (Kin, Parents’ Evening, and Living Room in Africa), about “we” vs “me,” the writer’s life in Harlem, and what current play we need to see right this minute.

Do you create characters that exist outside of your personal sense of we?

I create characters out of me not we.  If my characters don’t reflect a part of myself then I don’t understand them so they end up disappearing from drafts. I don’t always know at first what part of myself the character has accessed, but at some point I’ll realize they’re made up of a certain emotional makeup I experienced at some point in my past. And the dream is that other people will see themselves in my me, then it’s a we, and hopefully we’re all less lonely for a second.  For more of this interview, go here.