I Am My Own Wife: Studies for a Play about the Life of Charlotte Von Mahlsdorf

I Am My Own Wife is the winner of the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

From the Obie Award-winning author of Quills comes this acclaimed one-man show, which explores the astonishing true story of Charlotte von Mahlsdorf. A transvestite and celebrated antiques dealer who successfully navigated the two most oppressive regimes of the past century-the Nazis and the Communists--while openly gay and defiantly in drag, von Mahlsdorf was both hailed as a cultural hero and accused of colluding with the Stasi.

In an attempt to discern the truth about Charlotte, Doug Wright has written "at once a vivid portrait of Germany in the second half of the twentieth century, a morally complex tale about what it can take to be a survivor, and an intriguing meditation on everything from the obsession with collecting to the passage of time" (Hedy Weiss, Chicago Sun-Times).


About the Author

Doug Wright's Quills received the 1995 Kesselring Prize for Best New American Play from the National Arts Club and a 1995 Village Voice Obie Award for Outstanding Achievement in Playwriting. Wright also wrote the screenplay adaptation of Quills, making his motion picture debut. The film was named Best Picture by the National Board of Review and was also nominated for three Oscars. Some of Wright's other plays include Interrogating the Nude, Watbanaland, The Stonewater Rapture, Dinosaurs, and a musical, Buzzsaw Berkeley, which features songs by Michael John LaChiusa. Wright has a bachelor's degree from Yale University and an M.F.A. from NYU. A member of the Dramatists Guild and the New York Theatre Workshop, he has taught playwriting at NYU and Princeton University.