Happy Fall: Glenn Morizio and Aubrey Deeker – Photo: CATF
“I’m enjoying this summer a little bit more,” says Peggy McKowen, Artistic Director of the Contemporary American Theater Festival. “Coming out of COVID was a challenging time — I felt very much like my mission was to keep us alive, to keep us producing work, and to keep us moving forward, but it was about survival. This is the first season where I’m starting to feel like, ‘Okay, maybe we’ve gotten over the hump of survival, and now we can move on to growing and thriving.'”
Held annually since 1991 on the campus of Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, CATF is celebrated for showcasing a variety of plays and playwrights, presenting fully staged productions of a handful of selected works each summer.
“They are all fully produced, fully rehearsed,” says McKowen, who began working with CATF in 2006 as a designer. “Lighting, sound, scenery, projections, costumes — it’s one of the things that really makes us rather unique as a new play festival. I think we’re one of the few left in the country that fully produces all of the new work in its season.”
The reason for producing full-scale shows — as opposed to, say, staged readings — says McKowen, is that “you don’t really know what the play will be like on stage until you fully produce it and an audience has the opportunity to experience all of the storytelling. For us to be able to offer new works to other theaters and help these playwrights get their work seen elsewhere is a really significant step. We hope the playwrights leave us with a better script — or with ideas on how to make their work even better. There aren’t a lot of places where that can happen.”
This year’s world premiere productions — all of which can be seen in a single weekend, says McKowen — are Did My Grandfather Kill My Grandfather by Cody Leroy Wilson, Side Effects May Include… by Lisa Loomer, Kevin Kling’s one-person show Unraveled, Mark St. Germain’s Magdalene, and Happy Fall: A Queer Stunt Spectacular by Lisa Sanaye Dring.
The latter — a gay love story set in the closeted world of movie stunt performers — is especially complex, featuring wirework, elaborate stunt choreography, actors playing against themselves via video projections, and even puppets.
“We have been working on that play for a couple of years,” says McKowen. “We knew it was going to be a big lift, so we partnered with the Rogue Artists Ensemble and the LGBT Center in Los Angeles to make it happen. It is super complex.
“But it’s also exciting to try something that offers a new kind of experience in the theater. It’s artistically thrilling to take on a project like that and to bring together a group of exceptionally talented people to figure it out. I think it’s exactly what you’re supposed to do when you’re trying to make art.”
Diversity in both content and presentation is a core value of the festival. “In addition to fearless art and diverse stories, our other two values are community and inclusion,” says McKowen. “It is one of the driving principles of this institution — to make work that represents a number of communities and includes a variety of narratives on stage.”
“It is essential to us to do it, but it is even more our responsibility to do it right now,” she continues. “We feel that we have a duty to rise in this moment — to continue creating opportunities for diverse voices and representation to be heard, seen, and experienced. Now is the time when it’s most important for people to gather in community and have conversations about how we live together in humanity.”
The Contemporary American Theater Festival runs through August 3 on the campus of Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, West Virginia, about an hour’s drive from Washington, D.C. Single tickets and festival passes are available by emailing boxoffice@catf.org or calling 681-240-2283. Visit www.catf.org.
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