Charles Weldon

Charles Weldon, a veteran actor known for the memorable roles he created for the stage, film and television, was designated to serve as Artistic Director of the Negro Ensemble Company in September 2004.

Weldon, a member of the company since 1970, performed in over 40 NEC productions, including such classics as A Soldier’s Play, The Great McDaddy, The Offering, The Brownsville Raid and The River Niger. Audiences have also seen him in such films as Stir Crazy, The River Niger and A Woman Called Moses, and on such prime time television shows as Law and Order, New York Undercover, Sanford and Son, and Police Story.

In addition to bringing life to scores of characters on the NEC stage, he has directed several productions for the company, and served on the faculty of its well-respected drama instruction program.

As Artistic Director, he is dedicated to preserving, sustaining and building upon the company’s contribution to the American theatre.

His objectives in taking the helm of the 40-year-old institution are to produce new works by and about African Americans; develop young playwrights through its Playwrights Lab; groom young theatre professionals through the Intensive Training Program established by the company’s founders, Douglass Turner Ward and Robert Hooks; cultivate a new generation of theatrical producers through its Producer-in-Residence program; and oversee the company’s innovative arts-in-education program that integrates the African American theatre into school curricula.

During his first season as artistic director (2004-05), Weldon premiered Blues in a Broken Tongue, a new play by Tony Award nominee, Leslie Lee. The playwright, a professor in the dramatic writing program at New York University, received a 1975 OBIE award for The First Breeze of Summer, another play that debuted on the NEC stage.

Weldon is also co-founder of the Alumni of the Negro Ensemble Company, a roster of distinguished performers that includes such luminaries as Phylicia Rashad, Denzel Washington, Hattie Winston, Samuel L. Jackson, Angela Bassett, Louis Gossett, Jr., Barbara Montgomery and other world-class artists.