The Point of Theater

I remember reading this quote from playwright Craig Lucas:

“ In order to earn a long standing position in our hearts — a play must deepen our appreciation for life, and to do that it must have depth.”

I believe that the point of all theater is to give the contemporary audience a fuller appreciation and better understanding of reality. And . . . theater can turn reality on its head; it can turn it inside out and confuse all the issues so that the audience is left with a bunch of unanswered questions. This is what I like about contemporary theater . . . it does not promise easy solutions. Contemporary plays resist a single interpretation. I am drawn to playwrights who write plays that can simultaneously hold two or more conflicting opinions and defy single interpretations.

I seek plays that are full of philosophy, spirituality, psychology and politics . . . plays that are engaged with life . . . plays that are an intrinsic part of human existence.

—Ed Herendeen