The Trial of One Short Sighted Black Woman vs Mammy Louise and Safreeta Mae

Karani (Marcia Leslie) Johnson, began her writing career at the Inner-City Cultural Center in Los Angeles, where she won the grand prize in a playwriting contest for her one-act version of THE TRIAL OF ONE SHORT-SIGHTED BLACK WOMAN VS. MAMMY LOUISE AND SAFREETA MAE. She expanded the play into a full-length piece, where it was produced at the Shakespeare Festival Grove in Orange County, Los Angeles, as well as the Negro Ensemble in New York. THE TRIAL received rave reviews in the Chicago Sun Times and Tribune after a production at ETA Creative Arts Foundation in Chicago, under the direction of Paul Carter Harrison and produced by Abena Joan Brown. A later production at New Federal Theatre in New York, produced by Woodie King Jr. and again directed by Paul Carter Harrison, received rave reviews in the New York Times, and the New York Post. THE TRIAL has been produced in various theaters throughout the country to sold-out audiences, standing ovations, and many rave reviews. Ms. Johnson was honored with a key to the city off Louisville, Kentucky, her own day, and a Kentucky Colonel membership, following a benefit performance that had a tremendous effect on students at the university. Ms. Johnson, went on to write for television and work with numerous artists, including Bill Cosby, Robert Townsend, Vanessa Bell Calloway, Roger E. Mosely, Nell Carter, Mos Def, Anna Marie Horsford, Ron Glass, and for producer Paul Haggis. The Writer's Guild of America honored her with an award for the 101 best written TV shows for contributions on The Cosby Show. She retired as an editor for CBS Television Network, Television City, Los Angeles, where she had been the editor for the Montel Williams Show, and countless promos for a variety of shows such as Murphy Brown, The Good Wife, Survivor and Young and The Restless. Ms. Johnson, was also a trail-blazer, as the network's first black female videotape editor. She is a graduate of Northwestern University's School of Speech, and received her MFA in creative writing from Otis College of Art and Design. She is a former chair of both the California Afro-American Museum's History Council and its Conversations Committee, as well as one of the founders of The Compton 125 Historical Society. She also serves on the board of The World Stage Performance Arts Center in Leimert Park, Los Angeles. She is a native of Cincinnati, Ohio.