By women, for everyone: This festival is showcasing work by developing writers

The Women's Work Festival is a four-day annual celebration in St. John's of plays-in-progress that offers a stomping ground for playwrights to read their drafts to an audience, and get instant feedback about what's working. 

The festival was founded 18 years ago by RCA Theatre Company, She Said Yes and White Rooster Theatre. Since then it has gone on to help develop over 66 plays with over half of them going on to become full productions. 

The festival — which concludes Sunday night at the LSPU Hall — offers free or by-donation events, including readings, workshops, panels and musical performances. 

All works are produced by women and other marginalized genders. 

Playwright Susan Kelsey said writers can apply with a script. When selected, "you get to work the dramaturge," she said, referring to a professional who provides advice on the script. 

Kelsey, who is working on a monologue play called Gold Star Girlfriend, says she has been writing the work for the past two years. 

WATCH | Learn how this festival wants to make things more dramatic in St. John's:

This St. John’s festival celebrates plays-in-progress — and women

9 months ago

Duration 1:50

he Women’s Work Festival is in its 18th year. Is your script stuck in limbo? As festival co-ordinator Susan Kelsey explains, accepted writers can work toward bringing it to a full production. The CBC’s Ife Alaba has more on the five-day event.

"Out of the pandemic, I really wanted to write something that was that I wanted to see and that would make me laugh, and just kind of be be a love story," she told CBC News. 

Friday's agenda included a performance walk, but thanks to inclement weather, it turned into a performance stay, grounding all activity to one venue.

"Originally, this was supposed to be kind of like a art crawl throughout downtown where we would [be] stationed in different locations and the participants would kind of walk around to meet all of us and experience their performances," said musician Maria Cherwick.

"We're really happy to just be doing a little performance here at the LSPU Hall today.… I think it's a great opportunity to kind of discover something new, maybe see something you haven't seen before."

The festival concludes Sunday with workshops, readings and a performance at 7 p.m. NT that features singer Nico Paulo and a reading by playwright Sharon King-Campbell.

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