Cordell Green Festival is the CATS Meow

I know I've written quite a bit about community theatre lately, but it's an area of the not-for-profit theatre realm that really moves and inspires me. This past weekend, I had the good fortune to be invited to participate as the director of a local new play festival produced by a small community theatre in the city where I live.

Photos courtesy of Zachery Kocurek, Lisa Hernandez, and CATS Theater

The Cordell Green Festival is a multi-step process which leads up to a day of performances. After a call for submissions, several plays are chosen by a committee of the theatre's board members to be presented in festival format. Also, a board member is chosen as producer to make the festival a reality. This year, a very hard-working and energetic young man named Zachery Kocurek brilliantly organized and orchestrated the event. Only the first act of each play is staged, and the playwright or the director (if the playwright isn't present) describes what happens in the remaining acts of the play. A group of board members is present to fill out a ballot for each play. The ballots have a rubric and space for notes. At the end of the day, the ballots are tallied, and a play is chosen to be fully-produced in the theatre's regular season.
I think this is a remarkable event for several reasons, but here are my top three:

1. The festival is a fantastic opportunity for local and regional playwrights to see their work staged. Even though only one play will be granted a full production, the playwrights involved have a chance to see and hear at least a portion of their work. The plays are all still works in progress, so the playwrights have a chance to analyze the presentation to guide them in shaping the plays even more.

Photos courtesy of Zachery Kocurek, Lisa Hernandez, and CATS Theater

2. It's a great challenge for actors. All of the actors involved are volunteers, and they were all cast in multiple plays. Many were quite young, and had to work to portray characters that were not necessarily their "type." Opportunities to stretch dramatic muscles in this way are few and far between, so I'm glad these actors made the choice to step out of their comfort zones.


3. It also forced me to step out of my comfort zone as a director. I had to get seven works ready to present in a very brief rehearsal period. I love preparation, table work, approaching blocking organically, etc, etc, etc... but I had to let a lot of that go and find a new approach in getting these works on their feet. We worked basic entrances and exits, had benches behind the main playing area to represent backstage space, used minimal furniture and no props or costumes, and I did what I could to help the actors look and sound their best while reading these works. Since the presentation was so minimalistic, we also had a designated reader for stage directions, to help the audience envision what we were unable to successfully create onstage. Although I would not want to work this way all the time, I found it to be an effective way to make my brain let go of my directing habits and rely more upon instinct (and good old fashioned stage directions!).

Photos courtesy of Zachery Kocurek, Lisa Hernandez, and CATS Theater

The only negative aspect of the festival that I noted was lack of publicity. There was no admission charged for the festival, and patrons could come and go, if they did not wish to see all seven plays. This was a great opportunity to invite new audiences into the theatre and draw attention to the focus on original work. Social media could have been a major (and free!) part of an overall publicity campaign. The house should have been full, but was fairly empty throughout the day. This was only the second annual Cordell Green Festival, so I'm sure after analyzing what needs to be changed and improved, publicity will be at the top of the list for next year.

For me, this experience proved what vital work community theatres continue to do and are rarely recognized for doing. Giving new plays a chance to be staged and young practitioners a chance to play a part in developing them is gutsy and needed work. I hope more local theatres will take a cue from the Cordell Green Festival at CATS Theater. Festivals like this one give opportunities to artists and to the producing organizations to bring new audiences into their theatres. And helping to develop art, artists, and audiences are three important reasons why not-for-profit theatres even exist!

Until Next Time...
Ro Huizinga