The congregation of the Christ Reformed United Church of Christ donated the historic building to the Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF), which produces and develops new plays for worldwide audiences.
A 275-year-old church in Shepherdstown will be repurposed as a theater venue after its final service was held earlier this year.
The congregation of the Christ Reformed United Church of Christ donated the historic building to the Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF), which produces and develops new plays for worldwide audiences.
Founded in 1747, the United Church of Christ is the oldest church in Shepherdstown. It held its final service in January after the retirement of its pastor.
“The church congregation had begun to see that there was a need to maybe move that building on to its next purpose,” CATF Artistic Director Peggy McKowen said. “And so they started talking to various nonprofits that they wanted to give it to. It really is a situation in which people just happen to be at the right place at the right time, overhearing a conversation.”
McKowen said she wants to preserve what made the church special to its congregation while making it a place for the community to gather.
“We met with the representatives from the church, and I had a long conversation about really protecting the integrity of some of the historical elements of the church,” McKowen said. “The stained glass windows, also with the church comes the graveyard and the responsibility of that. I think the church congregation felt comfortable that CATF would uphold the usage of the building with a great sort of responsibility and grace to maintain the things that were really valued about it.”
The church will be used as a rehearsal space in the short-term with plans to use it as a performance venue in the future. By using the space this season, CATF is able to accommodate their talent’s work more easily. But before it’s available as a space for live performances, renovations need to be made to accommodate future audiences. That includes new restrooms, expanded seating and rigging for lights and sound.
One idea is to devise a system to block the stained glass windows for blackouts during live performances, while keeping them revealed for other events. CATF is currently planning on fundraising for the new additions.
“It would be really, really amazing and wonderful if our season in 2024 could have a performance down there as part of the summer,” McKowen said. “Whether that’s truly realistic, we’ll just have to see.”
The renovated church will be open to the public this year for the festival’s Fall Reading Series, which presents readings of plays under consideration for the 2024 season.
This year’s CATF season will take place from July 7 to July 30.
The Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown was one of many live cultural events around the state to balance safely entertaining audiences with working around COVID-19 last summer. This month, the festival has fully returned to its regular live performances.
The Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown was one of many live cultural events around the state to balance safely entertaining audiences with working around COVID-19 last summer. This month, the festival has fully returned to its regular live performances.
After postponing its yearly rotation of plays in 2020, the festival made a partial return in 2021. Organizers held outdoor events, released behind-the-scenes YouTube videos, and adapted plays as audio dramas.
Now that the six shows originally slated for the 2020 season are finally being debuted as full-fledged performances, Producing Artistic Director Peggy McKowen says there’s a feeling that the Eastern Panhandle’s cultural life is returning.
“It is a really nostalgic kind of moment for us at CATF to go through this transition and produce this work this summer. And it is really heartwarming to know that these audiences are still supporting us,” McKowen said.
She said there had been some uncertainty in the process of bringing the works to life. Staff had to overcome economic uncertainty and take care of mental health during production. Because of the amount of time between when the festival started work on the plays in 2020 and when the live performances debuted in 2022, much of the plays’ personnel also ended up changing.
“As time evolved, we lost some of those initiating members of the team. Of the six plays, only one of the directors has stayed through the process from 2020 to 2022,” McKowen said. “So we have five new directors who came on at various moments throughout the last two years. That’s been very interesting, because they bring a different perspective to the play, even though we had some shape to the play already.”
The festival is running six different plays through the end of the month, including:
Whitelisted by Chisa Hutchinson
The Fifth Domain by Victor Lesniewski
Babel by Jacqueline Goldfinger
Ushuaia Blue by Caridad Svich
The House of the Negro Insane by Terence Anthony
Sheepdog by Kevin Artigue
Information about the plays and their showtimes can be found on CATF’s website.
The founder of one of the country’s top theater festivals for new plays is retiring.
Ed Herendeen has been the producing director for the Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF) in Shepherdstown, West Virginia for the past 30 years.
He will step down in December.
According to a news release, Herendeen founded the festival in 1991 and was key to guiding the organization to its well-respected status as a professional theater organization.
“At the time, there were so few places that fully produced new work,” Herendeen said. “There was a critical need for the nurturing of, and the development and production of new plays.”
A major part of CATF’s founding was thanks to then-Shepherd College president Michael Riccards. Today, Shepherd University remains the festival’s home.
With Herendeen retiring, Associate Producing Director Peggy McKowen has been appointed as the festival’s Acting Producing Director.
There will be a nationwide search for CATF’s next leader.
Since 1991, the festival has produced more than 130 new plays, including 56 world premieres.
“It’s always been about the work on stage, about the voice of the playwrights. The plays deal with timely issues. They ask questions. They inspire conversation and even controversy. That’s why the festival has grown,” Herendeen said.
Many of CATF’s plays have gone on to Broadway and Off-Broadway.
“Shepherd University has enjoyed a very special partnership with Ed and the Contemporary American Theater Festival for over 30 years,” said Shepherd University President Mary Hendrix. “Ed’s creative vision and unparalleled commitment to authenticity and excellence will long be remembered. His passion for performance and evoking emotional responses to real life issues underscore his remarkable legacy. Ed is an icon of our times.”
During the onset of COVID-19, countless organizations and venues had no choice but to shut their doors, forcing many institutions, including those found in artistic communities across West Virginia, to adjust.
The Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF) in Shepherdstown is one institution in the midst of recovery. Operating in Shepherdstown, a small town with a population of fewer than 2,000 people, visitors can easily see the community’s vibrant, artistic roots.
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Peggy McKowen, the Contemporary American Theater Festival (CATF) associate producing director.
Like other artistic institutions around the state, CATF was forced to put development of its yearly rotation of plays on hold in 2020, instead opting to look for other ways to entertain audiences in the meantime. Peggy McKowen, the theater festival’s associate producing director, worked with the staff to find new alternatives.
“Although we could not produce a season last year, we were able to continue developing the plays with the design teams, and the directors, and the playwrights,” McKowen said.
The festival’s staff got inventive with how they were able to make theater safe for audiences. The organization was able to do what McKowen calls a “deep dive” on their previously scheduled plays for 2020, while delaying the live performances until after the pandemic. Melissa Crespo, director of the festival’s performance of Sheepdog, written by Kevin Artigue, was one of the group of creatives making it happen.
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Melissa Crespo, director of the festival’s performance of Sheepdog.
“The more we can keep artists employed and get audiences watching stories again and enjoying art in different ways, the better,” Crespo said. “I’m optimistic and grateful to still be working in whatever capacity that is.”
In the meantime, festival staff uploaded a YouTube series called “The Making Of,” detailing the processes that go into their plays. They also got to work creating audio drama adaptations for both Sheepdog and The House of the Negro Insane by Terence Anthony, while also continuing to work on the stage performances. It was a completely new experience for those involved, including for William Oliver Watkins, who plays the lead role of Attius in The House of the Negro Insane.
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Actor William Oliver Watkins. He plays the lead role of Attius in The House of the Negro Insane.
“We were trying to — and I hope we succeeded — allow the listener to submerge him or herself and be almost a silent member of the cast in a way that we couldn’t even really accomplish in the theater,” Watkins said.
Watkins has been involved with multiple productions with CATF in the past, and thinks that new social norms and technologies that grew in popularity during COVID could affect how theater is produced in the future.
“I think live theater is always going to be there, no amount of Zooming can ever make up for being in a space with people and feeling that kind of energy. But the productions around it, I think, are gonna continue to take advantage of this remote technology because it does allow you to be in four places at once,” Watkins said.
CATF’s work during the pandemic will pay off this July, as they put on four weekly street parties each Friday starting July 9th. Each party will be completely outdoors in downtown Shepherdstown, with the first two parties featuring local musicians, poets, and artists from the Eastern Panhandle along with performances of selected scenes from theater festival plays .
Beginning July 23 and continuing July 30th, these events will feature listening parties for the audio drama productions of The House of the Negro Insane and Sheepdog, with headphones available to party-goers as these editions debut to the public. McKowen says these parties are the perfect way to revitalize the Shepherdstown community in the wake of COVID-19.
“We thought the best thing to do would be downtown, on the street, in the middle of the community, where everybody can see us, everybody can be part of it,” McKowen said.
The return of the CATF is important economically, It attracts tourists from 39 states, and an economic impact study estimated the festival brings in $5.8 million to Shepherdstown. But the festival is also important to the artistic heart of the community.
“I think CATF is incredibly special because it is one of the few cradles for new work within the US — and who knew it was in West Virginia?” Crespo said. “And I know from experience there are audience members that come every year, and it’s wonderful to see that loyalty. People know when you go to CATF, you’re not going to see your average play.”
As more West Virginians get vaccinated and COVID restrictions begin to relax, McKowen thinks local communities around the state are regaining an important part of what makes those communities thrive: their artistic centers.
“I truly believe that theater is the artistic medium of a community. I truly believe what we put on stage should reflect what is happening to the people in our world today, in our very communities,” McKowen said. “We can look at things, we can talk about things that otherwise might seem uncomfortable, and we can have a good conversation about that, and we can share with each other in a way that just makes our community stronger.”
The Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown, West Virginia just closed on its 29th season. The festival draws visitors from all over the world to West Virginia and has helped the state stand out in the professional theater scene.
West Virginia Public Broadcasting spoke with Associate Producing Director Peggy McKowen to talk about the festival’s legacy, impact, and what’s ahead for its 30th season.
CATF was founded in 1991 by Producing Director Ed Herendeen. To date, 121 new plays have been produced, including 47 world premieres by 85 American playwrights. CATF has also commissioned 10 new American plays.
According to the festival’s website, 50 percent of all their plays have been produced by women writers. In 2017, CATF issued more than 17,500 tickets to 5,500 patrons from 36 states, Washington, D.C., and around the globe.
The Contemporary American Theater Festival states its mission is to produce and develop new American theater; to provide the ultimate theater experience and produce fearless art; daring and diverse stories and to create a profound dynamic among the audience, the artist and the work.
The Contemporary American Theater Festival in Shepherdstown will, for the first time, take one of its world premieres to Off-Broadway in New York City.
In August, CATF finished up its 24th season, but that wasn’t quite the end. To its surprise, the festival was invited to transfer one of this season’s productions to New York City’s Off-Broadway venue, 59E59 Theaters. The play chosen wasUncanny Valley by Thomas Gibbons.
Uncanny Valley is set in the near future and portrays the relationship between Julian, an artificial intelligence being, and Claire, a neuroscientist tasked with teaching him how to become “human.”
This is the first time in the Festival’s 24 year history that it will move one of its Shepherdstown productions as-is to a new venue.
“It’s a really thrilling opportunity,” said Ed Herendeen, the founder and producing director of the Contemporary American Theater Festival, “You know we’ve had several of our plays produced in New York…and several of our plays have been produced around the country at regional theaters, but this is the very first time one of our productions will transfer to New York City.”
Herendeen says this opportunity wouldn’t have been possible if it hadn’t been for the success of the festival and its location.
“We are passionate about our geography. We really, really believe that place matters, and in many ways, the success of the Contemporary American Theater Festival is directly related to our geography; the eastern panhandle, Shepherdstown, the state of West Virginia. So this is going to give and shine a positive light on our state.”
Uncanny Valley by Thomas Gibbons will be presented in New York City between October 2-26.
To learn more about the play, you can visit the CATF website or watch this teaser trailer from the Contemporary American Theater Festival’s Vimeo page.
