This Land was Made
By Tori Sampson
‘But you want to lay a truth on me and then ask me to shut up about it. Go against my nature. Feed you, starve myself. So you get all the light and I’m left with heavy. Your heavy.’
Oakland, 1967. In Miss Trish’s bar, local 20-somethings work, study, fight, fall in love and dream of a different world. On the streets, the Black Panther Party is organizing armed patrols against police brutality. John Frey, an on-duty officer, will soon be shot and killed. Huey Newton, the co-founder of the Black Panthers, will be charged and stand trial for his murder.
A Boston native, Tori Sampson’s plays include IF PRETTY HURTS UGLY MUST BE A MUHFUKA (Playwrights Horizons, 2019), THIS LAND WAS MADE (Vineyard Theatre: Lab, 2018), and CADILLAC CREA (Yale Repertory Theater, 2019). Her plays have been developed at Great Plains Theatre Conference, Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s The Ground Floor residency program, Victory Garden’s IGNITION Festival of New Plays, Playwrights Foundation, and Ubuntu Theater. Tori is a 2017–18 Playwright’s Center Jerome Fellow and a 2018-19 McKnight Fellow. Two of her plays appeared on the 2017 Kilroys List. Her awards and honors include the 2016 Relentless Award, Honorable Mention; the 2016 Paula Vogel Award in Playwriting from The Kennedy Center; the Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award, Second Place; the Alliance Theater’s 2017 Kendeda Prize, Finalist; the 2018 Susan Smith Blackburn Prize, Finalist and the recipient of the 2018 National Theater Conference’s, Paul Green Award. Tori, is currently working on commissions from Berkeley Repertory Theatre, Yale Repertory Theatre, Atlantic Theater Company and Playwrights Horizon. She holds a BS in sociology from Ball State University and an MFA in playwriting from Yale School of Drama.
Tori is eligible for the Bruntwood Prize International Award
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