John C. Russell, a playwright whose works appeared in Off Broadway theaters in New York City, died on Friday in New York Hospital in Manhattan. He was 31 and lived in Manhattan.
The cause was AIDS, his parents said.
Mr. Russell belonged to the Circle Repertory's Playwrights Project and was the chairman of the Circle Repertory board. He was also a member of the New Dramatists and was the author of half a dozen plays, some of which were staged at BACA Downtown in Brooklyn and at the Joseph Papp Public Theater and the Downtown Art Company, both in Greenwich Village. He was a graduate of Oberlin College and received a master's degree in fine arts from Brown University.
He is survived by his parents, Charles and Ruth Russell of Huntington, L.I.
