Gloria Majule

Gloria Majule

Gloria Majule is a storyteller born and raised in Dodoma, Tanzania. She seeks to tell stories that bring multiple black voices together from across the world, and are accessible to black audiences no matter where they are. She writes for and about Africans and the African diaspora. Gloria has been commissioned by Audible and Atlantic Theater Company. Her work has been supported by Vassar’s Powerhouse Theater,...
Gloria Majule is a storyteller born and raised in Dodoma, Tanzania. She seeks to tell stories that bring multiple black voices together from across the world, and are accessible to black audiences no matter where they are. She writes for and about Africans and the African diaspora. Gloria has been commissioned by Audible and Atlantic Theater Company. Her work has been supported by Vassar’s Powerhouse Theater, The New Harmony Project, The New Group, and Great Plains Theater Commons among others. Her canon includes Culture Shock (Winner: Leah Ryan Prize, Finalist: O’Neill, Alliance/Kendeda, BAPF ), Uhuru (Finalist: Blue Ink Award, Premiere Stages, BAPF), My Father was Shot in the Back of the Head (Finalist: O’Neill, Seven Devils, Orchard Project), and Fifteen Hundred (Finalist: Seven Devils). Gloria was a guest speaker for the Courageous Art Panel at Starbucks, and the President's Tea at Vassar College. She graduated summa cum laude from Cornell University with a BA in Performing & Media Arts and Spanish, and was the first African woman to receive an MFA in Playwriting from Yale School of Drama.

Plays

  • (American Theater)
    FIVE MINUTE PLAY
    A writer and a producer meet to discuss plays.
  • Afropick
    Commissioned by Atlantic Theater Company:
    Pendo can’t stay in America. At least, not without an enormous amount of money that she does not have. The faster time runs out on her student visa, the more desperate she gets, and the more she is forced to confront the horrors and opportunities of migration in this transatlantic dramedy.
  • Blessings
    ONE ACT PLAY
    Commissioned by Yale Summer Cabaret:
    Three black women try to move forward in the wake of an untimely death.
  • Culture Shock
    Zahra and Hawi, two brilliant students from East Africa, start school in an Ivy League Institution. They experience new levels of (dis)orientation in a whirl of competitive placements and cultural clashes.
  • Fifteen Hundred
    Nantei, Vivi and Rachel are equally fast when it comes to running the fifteen hundred, but there is only one spot available on the Kenyan Olympics Team.
  • Life Sentence
    Baba Grace faces a lawsuit where he must pay a large sum of money or go to jail. He plans to marry off Grace to a wealthy lawyer in exchange for a hefty bride price that will save him and his reputation. However, Grace has secrets of her own that could completely jeopardize his plans.
  • Mala Aria
    Hoping to discover how to eradicate Malaria, Amazia leaves her family in Tanzania to pursue a PhD abroad. An unforeseen turn of events puts her in a position where she has to decide between staying in the west and going back home to finish what she started.
  • My Father was Shot in the Back of the Head
    All his life, her father had wanted a son. Therefore even before she was born, she was already a disappointment. My Father was Shot in the Back of the Head is a dark comedy that uses conventions of African storytelling theater to tell an unconventional coming of age story.
  • Possessed (or, "the Crazy African Girl" play)
    Furaha returns home to Tanzania on a medical leave, and is reunited with her brother Angaza. Unfortunately for her, he believes her mental illness is in fact a demon possession, and has a plan to sort it out. As the siblings road trip from Dar Es Salaam to Singida, they encounter colorful characters and testing challenges along the way. Possessed is a dramedy that explores the toll it takes to leave home, and the toll it takes to be back.
  • Pretty Privilege
    TEN MINUTE PLAY
    Coffee and Caramel reflect on a controversial casting announcement.
  • Savage Training
    Commissioned by Audible:
    Queenie, Xander, Raya and Neema are invited to a leadership training in the Serengeti that will help them become outstanding global citizens.
  • Uhuru
    Mshale, a Mount Kilimanjaro tour guide, dreams of marrying a white woman and moving to the West. Sprite doesn’t like white people and sets out to decolonize what he deems “his mountain”. Henry and Frannie are white missionaries who claim to be Tanzanian. Uhuru is a dramedy that follows this unlikely foursome, as they journey together to the roof of Africa.
  • Uncut
    ONE ACT PLAY
    Tumaini and Chilyawanhu are "happily married" until an unexpected change in the family threatens to destroy their fragile illusion of happily ever after.