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Dramaturgs Note
The history of The Color Purple is much like the color itself; a transformational force
ever in the process of evolution and change. The Color Purple has made itself manifest in the
world as a hugely successful and critically lauded novel, movie, and staged Broadway musical.
Written by author, poet, activist Alice Walker, The Color Purple burst on to the literary scene in
1982 and within a year of its first publication won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and the National
Book Award.
The Color Purple loosely traces elements from Walkers personal family history. Born on
February 9
th
, 1944 in Eatonon, Georgia (also known as the Jim Crow South), Walker was the
youngest of Willie Lee Walker and Minnie Lou Tallulah Grants eight children. Her father
worked as a sharecropper and her mother as a domestic servant. Ms. Walker attended Spelman
College on a full scholarship in 1961 and it was there that she met Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
who greatly influenced her to become an activist in the Civil Rights Movement. Shortly after that
Walker went on to volunteer to register black voters in Georgia and Mississippi and take part in
the 1963 March on Washington. During the 70s, Walker worked as an editor for Ms Magazine,
where she helped to renew and revive interest in Zora Neale Hurston, whose work, for many, had
been lost to history. Ms. Walker is best known for her 1982 novel The Color Purple. Many of
Ms. Walkers works, including The Color Purple, engage themes of race, gender, class and
sexuality.
Originally written as an epistolary novel, The Color Purples structural form allowed
readers to fully immerse themselves within the world of the storys protagonist. Written as a
series of letters, Walkers work takes us on a journey into the heart of a woman whose voice
like many impoverished and disenfranchised African American women over the course of the
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20
th
centuryhad been silenced. The Color Purple shifts the placement of the African American
female from the margins to the centerrevealing the margin as a site of agency. Using the
written word as a powerful transformative tool of self-affirmation Celie is able to begin a life
long journey back to herself. This structure not only provides space for Celie to become narrator
of her own story, it also highlights a history of literacy within post-Emancipation African
American communities. In addition, it brings to light the power that the ability to read and write
held for black women as a form of self-expression and agency. As a musical, literacy remains a
dynamic and powerful force within the play however, music and the theatrical genre of the
musical also allow for an alternative realm of intimacy and insight into a character that has the
ability to transcend text and the convention of realism. The musical is a perfect vehicle to display
Celies epic journey of resiliency. Music provides a means for Celie to be able express herself in
ways that are beyond the confines of the everyday. Similar to the letter format of the novel, song
allows Celies interior world to spring to life before us.
As a key figure of the mid to late 70s/early 80s black feminist/Womanist movement,
Walkers The Color Purple functions as a political work that employs the argument that sexism,
class oppression, and racism are inextricably linkedworking as interdependent systems of
oppression. As evident in the character of Celie, Walker does not prioritize isms but rather
gives them equal weight as spaces of oppression that fix the ways that hierarchies of value are
placed upon the body. As his last reach of control over Celie, Mister states, You cant curse
nobody. You black, you poor, you ugly, you a woman. And, in the now famous Easter Dinner
scene Celie responds, I may be pore. I may be Black. I may be ugly. But Im here!. The I may
be before each classification nods to a slipperiness in the ways that these terms may or may not
continue to define Celie. However, the real transformational power comes in her affirmation that
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Im here! Celie claims agency in her presence. No matter how she is defined by Mister Celie
finds strength in her own acknowledgement of self. It is a sense of self that like the color purple
connotes a rebirth that echoes Camus famous quote, In the midst of winter, I finally learned
that there was in me an invincible summer.
Additionally, The Color Purple mobilizes relationships to challenge traditional modes of
patriarchy. Celie and Shugs homosexual relationship subverts the traditional marriage plot. In
addition, The Color Purple pivots around a series of female centered relationships that work as
spaces of refuge from patriarchy for both men and women. This can be seen in the relationships
between Nettie and Celie, and Sofia and her sisters in songs like Hell No! At the same time,
Walker also highlights the ways that female relationships within the patriarchal structures place
women in adversarial roles, such as when Celieechoing Mistersuggests to Harpo, you gon
have to beat her if he want to keep her in-line as a traditional wife. Walker further challenges
patriarchy by framing it as both violent and oppressive for everyone who navigates that system
including Ol Mister, Mister and Harpo.
Since its inception, The Color Purple has been a cultural lighting rod. As a Pulitzer Prize
winning novel and a prominent work of literary, cinematic, and theatrical black cultural
re/presentation The Color Purple carries a tremendous amount of cultural weight. When objects
become part of the American Canonwhere The Color Purple residesthere is always the
danger for people to view the work as historical or representative of a particular community
verses a work of historical fiction. Conversely, while many critics embraced Walkers work
others felt that it reaffirmed older racist stereotypes about pathologies of family, violence, sex,
and sexuality in the African American communityparticularly in relationship to now the
infamous 1965 Moynihan Report.
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In 1985, this explosively charged novel became an equally controversial movie. Directed
by Steven Spielberg, the film adaptation starred Whoopi Goldberg, Danny Glover, and Oprah
Winfrey. Many people thought that Spielbergwho at the time was mostly known for creating
big budget action adventure filmswas unqualified to direct a film about an African American
protagonist. However, Oprah Winfrey said the film was one of the single greatest experiences of
her life. She would even go on to name her production company HARPO, which is also Oprah
spelled backwards. Nominated for 11 Academy Awards, including Best Picture, The Color
Purple ultimately went home empty handed that year. Nevertheless, The Color Purple was
hugely successful at the box office. It became the fourth highest grossing film of 1985playing
in US theatres for over 20 weeks and taking in over $140 million worldwide.
Critic Roger Ebert awarded the film four stars, calling it "the year's best film." He also
praised Whoopi Goldberg, calling her role "one of the most amazing debut performances in
movie history." Furthermore, Ebert wrote, When a [] character is really working, we become
that character. [] I am not female, I am not black, I am not Celie, but for a time during "The
Color Purple," my mind deceives me that I am all of those things, and as I empathize with her
struggle and victory, I learn something about what it must have been like to be her. Celie is a
great powerful [] character, and to feel her story is to be blessed with her humanity. Have we
all felt ugly? Have we all been afraid to smile? Have we all lost precious things in our lives?
Have we dared to dream? Celie endures and prevails, and so hope lives.
In 2005, The Color Purple evolved into its third incarnation as a Broadway musical
produced by Quincy Jones and Oprah Winfrey. The Broadway production was nominated for 11
Tony awards and 5 Outer Critics Awards, including Outstanding Broadway Musical and
Outstanding New Score. The Broadway run closed on February 24
th
, 2008 and is currently
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touring across the country. Recently, The Color Purple made the American Library Association
list of the 100 Most Frequently Challenged Books in the first decade of the 21
st
century, ranking
number 17, further proof, that this story of hope, love and unyielding resiliency, is still as
relevant today as it was when it was first published.
I hope that you find this story as inspiring as I do. I invite you to open your hearts and
enjoy the ride!