Celeste Bedford Walker

Acclaimed playwright Celeste Bedford Walker is the author of over twenty plays that have received numerous accolades including national awards and productions. She has received the August Wilson Playwriting Award, multiple NAACP Image Awards, New York’s AUDELCO Award, and she was a finalist for the Susan Smith Blackburn Prize. The New York Times has praised her plays as “forceful, well-crafted” and “vigorous social satire” and “an uproariously good time.” Dramalogue has described her work as “practically flawless.” Her play Camp Logan has been performed at major venues around the country, including the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C., where the Washington Post lauded her as “a textbook example of how to simultaneously entertain and educate an audience.”

Ms. Walker began donating her literary papers to the Wittliff Collections in 2017. Listed below is a preliminary inventory of the Collection.

For more information on Celeste Bedford Walker: https://celestebedfordwalker.com/

 

ARCHIVAL INVENTORY: CELESTE BEDFORD WALKER PAPERS

 

Accession 2018-2012

Donation by Celeste Bedford Walker of her typescript plays, “Distant Voices”, “Sassy Mamas”, “Greenwood: An American Dream Destroyed”, and “Reunion in Bartersville”, included in the collection are synopses, reviews, Walker’s Biography, and her induction into the Texas Institute of Letters, 1983-2017.

Collection Box 1673, Folders 14-16

1673            14           Typescripts of “Distant Voices” and “Greenwood: An American Dream Destroyed” by
                                           Walker commissioned by The Ensemble Theatre, including synopsis and reviews,
                                            October 1998 (1 of 3)
1673           15            Typescript of “Sassy Mamas” by Walker, including article “Laughter is the Heart of
                                           Loveable ‘Sassy Mamas’” by Wei-Huan Chen, 2007-2016 (2 of 3)
1673           16            Typescript of “Reunion in Bartersville” by Walker, including correspondence, Walker’s Bio,
                                           list of plays, articles about Walker, and her induction into TIL, 1983-2017 (3 of 3)

 

June 21, 2018 Accession

CAMP LOGAN Collection

Box # / Folder #

 

1/ 1      Note from CBW indicating the materials donated

 

1/2       CAMP LOGAN stage play

 

1/3       “CAMP LOGAN: A World War I Screenplay.” First Draft, September 1998. Adapted from the stage play “CAMP LOGAN.”

 

1/4       CAMP LOGAN scene breakdown w/handwritten annotations, followed by 2 handwritten pages

 

1/5       Mountaintop Productions, Mountain Special Series, History as Drama Workshop, “Act n’ Write” with CBW bio, Alley Theatre Hype Workshop, “Once in a Wifetime” partial script, “CAMP LOGAN” partial script, program for Mountaintop Productions/Montgomery County Community College “CAMP LOGAN” Jan 16, 1993

1/6       envelope with photos and correspondence re CAMP LOGAN

 

1/7       Texas Festival @ Kennedy Center, CAMP LOGAN clippings

 

1/8       DVD- Buffalo Soldiers Mutiny Houston 1917. CD- CAMP LOGAN sound [effects, cues]

 

1/9       2 cassettes: “The Regal Theatre :60 CAMP LOGAN WLNR/WJPC. “CAMP LOGAN commercial”

 

1/10     envelope labeled “CAMP LOGAN photos, Public News Article, Texas Hot Links.” Inside envelope: correspondence, Public News cover story, two performance announcements, two other newspaper clippings [but no photos]

 

1/11     CAMP LOGAN photocopies of clippings, announcement for LA show at Robey Theatre

 

1/12     CAMP LOGAN research, reviews, script fragments, scene breakdown

 

1/13     3 copies of The Houston Riot and Courts-Martial of 1917 [booklet], 4 copies of The Buffalo Soldiers, America’s Black Regiments of the West [pamphlet], 4 copies of CAMP LOGAN program, 1998 Houston [several additional copies of the pamphlets/booklets not added to archive - contact CBW to ask about them

 

1/14     CAMP LOGAN flyers, announcements

 

1/15     scrapbook in black binder: Letters, flyers, prize info, etc, [clippings, PR materials re “CAMP LOGAN” and other CBW plays]

 

1/16     Scrapbook in yellow binder: photos/flyers from plays [and other materials including correspondence, reviews, clippings, etc].

 

Box 2 [oversize, 16x20”]

 

• Framed Bluebonnet Award for Achievement to Celeste Bedford Walker

• New York Times magazine section, 11/22/1925 (condition: brittle and crumbling)

• New York Times Book Review, 11/22/1926 (condition: brittle and crumbling)

• 3 sets of mounted photo sets from CAMP LOGAN production (photos are wrinkled & dented)

• 1 color photocopy of a CAMP LOGAN photo from the original set listed above

 

Poster- CAMP LOGAN 32x44” Robey Theater, Los Angeles

 

Artifact: mounted soldier figure, 13.5” tall. Attached plaque reads: “To CAMP LOGAN From XVIII ABN Corp  EO Office.” (this is 18th Airborne Corps, stationed at Fort Bragg)