This weekend Western Michigan University will premiere Activate Midwest—a new play festival for new plays—not to be confused with the Theatre Kalamazoo New Play Festival that happens every year, this fest focuses on full length works and draws playwrights from all over the Midwest, not just Kalamazoo.
Jeremy Llorence’s play "Cane River King" is the only Kalamazoo play on the schedule. Llorence got his masters degree from WMU and will start teaching at Otterbein University in Ohio in the fall. Llorence gives a summary of his play:
“Cane River King is the story of Emile Daniels, who is forced to go back to this little town called Natchitoches, Louisiana—which is where my family’s originally from—in order to deal with the affairs of his late uncle who has just passed. But he and his uncle have sort of a poor relationship and he’s not really excited about doing it, but in doing so he learns a lot about the town itself. It’s a very small town with like that sense of small-town Louisiana life. And he’s sort of forced to review all of that in a new lens.”
“Cane River King” was one of four plays chosen for the festival out of more than a hundred submissions. Joan Herrington chairs WMU’sTheatre Department. She says each of the plays were read “blind”—which means the authors names were omitted from the scripts. When asked if she was surprised that a WMU grad’s work made the final cut, Herrington said not really.
“He’s won tons of awards from the American College Theatre Festival, had work produced. So he’s local, but that’s part of our point that we have extraordinary artists here in Kalamazoo,” she says.
“For the size of this community, how much work we do. How much quality work we do—really high quality work, really professional level work. And we wanted to say to other people in our region: Do you know that we’re here? Do you know this great work that we’re doing?”
Activate Midwest allows playwrights to perfect their work. Actors will perform with script in hand so they can make any last-minute changes.
Professionals from renowned theatre companies in Chicago will also be in the audience to give feedback. Herrington says making contacts at places like The Steppenwolf and Goodman Theatre will help to break down barriers for local playwrights.
“So by association they could say, ‘Oh yeah, I’m part of, you know, Theatre Kalamazoo. I’m part of the Kalamazoo theatre community. Will you read my play?’ So we’re hoping to open those doors by bringing some of these professionals from Chicago in,” says Herrington.
At the end of the festival, the winning playwright will have their piece produced at the Victory Gardens Theatre in Chicago.
But while Activate Midwest is mostly about supporting up-and-coming playwrights, it will also host one that’s already made it. Award-winning playwright Sarah Ruhl will kick off the event Friday at 8 p.m. with her play “Oldest Boy.” Here’s Joan Herrington with a synopsis:
“It’s about a couple who has a child. He is a Tibetan refugee. And one day they are visited by a lama and a monk who tell them that their son is the reincarnation of one of the greatest lama teachers ever. And they want to take him back to his native homeland so that he be crowned and continue to teach. So it’s the struggle that this family has of perhaps giving up their child to a greater cause.”
Herrington says performing new works is always a risk—what if people don’t like it?
“But if we don’t develop new plays and we don’t do new plays, we will only be doing the same plays forever and theatre will wither. We must create new work,” she says.
“And have the courage as producing theatres to put that work up and to also say to audiences, ’This is worth it. Come on out.’ Yeah it’s something you haven’t heard of. Yeah it’s something you haven’t seen before. But we’ve decided it’s pretty amazing, it’s worth doing, and we would love for you to come and share it with us.”
The festival will be held in Western's Gilmore Theatre Complex from June 19th through 21st. All long-form plays are followed by a discussion with the playwright.
Friday, June 19
8 p.m. Sarah Ruhl's reading followed by a Q&A
10 p.m. New Play Project, five 10-minute plays
Saturday, June 20
4 p.m. "Home is a Passing Feeling" by Karina Cochran
8 p.m. "Spin" by Emilio Rodriguez
Sunday, June 21
2 p.m. "Cane River King" by Jeremy Llorence
5 p.m. "Ghostbears!" by Eric Appleton
Tickets for the event are free.
