This season’s production of Lynn Nottage’s Sweat marks both a culmination of her American Revolutions’ commission and a new beginning in OSF’s relationship with this acclaimed writer. Nottage joined American Revolutions, the U.S. History Cycle, OSF’s commissioning arm for new works, as it was launched in 2008. Sweat is the play she has created as part of that program. Even after our writers finish their commissions, they are always part of American Revolutions; however we have been commissioning only one play per playwright or ensemble. We are so happy that OSF and Nottage were selected as part of a new program, the Doris Duke Charitable Trust’s Theater Producing and Commissioning Initiative (DDCT/TPCI), which was created to help artists and theatres sustain and expand their relationships. This grant will enable OSF to commission another play from Nottage as well as support her and Sweat through various programming endeavors. With Sweat, Ruined (2010), Intimate Apparel (2006) and Crumbs from the Table of Joy (2000) along with the grant-commissioned play she will write for us, Nottage is one of the most-produced living playwrights at OSF.

Sweat is at once about a specific situation in Reading, Pennsylvania, and also a metaphor for what Nottage calls the de-industrial revolution. When she read that the 2010 United States Census identified Reading as the poorest city in the country, she knew she wanted to investigate further. For the last several years, Nottage conducted research and interviews in Reading for Sweat, absorbing that information to create her own story of how the way of life for factory workers evaporated. Much of the factory work that had built and sustained the area started to disappear with the economic crises of the 1970s, continued with the union-busting of the ’80s and crested with NAFTA in the ’90s. In this play, we spend time with a group of friends who work at a local factory. We see their jobs become increasingly threatened, until their middle-class existence as well as the relationships they’d built together become irreparably broken.

Not just a Reading problem

In American Revolutions, we saw a corollary in the Northwest. The timber industry, which built and supported so many communities here for generations, has dramatically shrunk. What remains operates under such a different economic model that even surviving towns have been fundamentally changed. Though many of the underlying reasons for the downturn differ from those in the Rust Belt and in Reading itself, the outcome here is similar: poverty, breakdown of families, drug abuse. With the DDCT/TPCI grant, we are able to explore these resonances more profoundly. The grant has two goals: to create a continuing relationship between artists and theatres, and to support the work of the play beyond the walls of the theatres. As Artistic Director Bill Rauch says, “We are honored to partner with this brilliant artist in presenting these stories, in launching her next commission and in finding meaningful ways to bring into the discussion economically challenged communities often overlooked by the American theatre.”

Part of the great satisfaction and sense of purpose we get from producing plays is to see audiences make the connection between their own lives and those represented on stage. This grant gives us the opportunity to adapt some of the methodology of Cornerstone Theater Company—which Bill Rauch and director of American Revolutions Alison Carey cofounded—to bring Sweat and its ideas into communities in Southern Oregon. Later this season, American Revolutions’ staff will travel with some of the actors from our production to towns in the area and create workshops for community members to write their own stories. The grant will also provide opportunities for our neighbors to see Sweat. We are also planning an event in Reading to bring this work to the people and city that inspired it.

Living Ideas

As we started planning the American Revolutions events, we also learned of a new OSF initiative—Living Ideas: Art and Community Dialogue Series. Living Ideas’ goal is to spur deep conversations among audience and community members about questions the plays raise. OSF has initiated many humanities-driven projects over the years, but Living Ideas brings them together into an official programming arm for the theatre. The program launches this year with conversations around Sweat. Events include lectures, discussions, film screenings and audience-engagement opportunities (Click here to go to the Living Ideas web page). American Revolutions and Living Ideas will be partnering for the work planned in surrounding communities and for events at the Medford Library and around the OSF campus. Robert C. Goodwin, the In-Residence Programs Manager for the Education Department, is spearheading this cross-departmental collaboration.

 “We are experimenting with connecting onsite events and digital content via our web page and streaming that content,” Goodwin says. “The possibilities are limitless in terms of whom we can engage. In the next few years, I see the programming becoming an interactive way for people to connect with OSF on campus, in the community or in their homes. The series will always remain accessible to the community and relevant in its programming, attracting people who want to engage in dialogue for the benefit of all.”

With Living Ideas, we will continue to expand the reach of one or two plays each season to come, and it is thrilling to launch this new initiative with Sweat.

For more information about Sweat, click here and here.