Welcome to talktheater

Welcome to my first blog. I am looking forward to beginning a free wheeling conversation on theater, new plays and my work as a director and producer.  So for those of you who don’t know me . . . allow me to introduce myself. My name is Ed Herendeen and I am the Founder and Producing Director of the Contemporary American Theater Festival. My producing partner is Peggy McKowen (Associate Producing Director) and she will be joining us in our talktheater blogging.

I started the Theater Festival in 1991 on a wing and a prayer and a $90,000 budget. My dream was to create a home for the development and production of new American plays. Now my dream has become a reality. In 2010 CATF will celebrate her 20TH Anniversary . . . an awesome milestone! It blows my mind.

I have a confession to make. I love theater. I spend a lot of time and energy witnessing theater, producing theater, directing theater and debating/talking theater. This thing I love is a demanding beast. Why do I do it? Because I need to. It’s my passion. It’s my calling. The theater thrills me and it feeds my insatiable hunger to express myself. This hunger demands that I take risks and push myself to take on ambitious and often times impossible projects. When the work is successful, it gives me great joy and when it fails . . . I keep working.

I believe that the theater is my vocation. Directing theater gives me unexplainable pleasure, and it often keeps me awake at night worrying about it. It can be the most fulfilling vocation imaginable. I also believe the greater the risks and the more challenging the projects . . . the greater the joy.

My passion for directing new work began in Graduate School at Ohio University.  I discovered the thrill and excitement of working on a new play with a living playwright.

Ever since then I have been hooked on producing and directing new work. New plays are produced without a safety net of tradition . . .there is no production history to fall back on.

Theater persists because of new plays. There is a profound joy in creating something new . . . for the first time.

The following quote by playwright Steven Dietz goes directly to my core as an Artistic Director:

“The theater is not about nostalgia. The theater is not a museum. Plays don’t hang on walls, oblivious to time. The theater is a rehearsal of the concerns of the present moment.”

–Ed Herendeen