Finding acceptance at the William Inge Theatre Festival
Independence, Kansas, celebrates a queer playwright and his work every year. It's a wholesome experience for all, regardless of identity.
The annual William Inge Theater Festival nurtures playwrights and their work by creating the space, community, and opportunity for them to flourish.
As the 2025 "Inge Fest" approaches, I’m pulled back into wholesome memories of last year's New Play Lab, which I was honored to be part of. As a queer playwright living in western Kansas, there have been moments in my career where I’m pressed to create less polarizing works, coded as "something wholesome" — so I’m wary of the word. But for this annual event, “wholesome” applies. I had a healing experience at a renowned theater festival where an entire town annually celebrates a gay man’s works — wholesomely — in that famously “wholesome” arena of drama, no less.
I arrived alongside my husband, excited to get to know the other playwrights and see the staged readings of our new works. There I met John Mabey, whose short play, “The Shape of Goodbye,” will be part of this year’s New Play Lab. Mabey's ardor and zest for theater and storytelling was contagious. They’d been part of small-town festivals before, but Independence left a strong impression of kindness.
“It was William Inge’s hometown, well known for his works,” Mabey said, reflecting on their first visit to Kansas. “I was excited because of that historical component. But other than that, I really didn’t know much.”
But true Midwesterners ensured Mabey got an authentic experience. Included as part of the travel and transport arrangements, “a very kind volunteer would drive all the way to Tulsa to pick me up, then drive me into Independence” — an 85-mile drive, one-way. An Atlanta-based playwright, Mabey is familiar with the South’s famous hospitality, but “you’d be hard-pressed to find someone to agree to such a long journey to pick up a stranger for a theater festival.”
This charmed me, having been raised in western Kansas where the rival school was an hour away. We traveled over five hours to get to Inge Fest.
Since meeting John and the rest of our playwright cohort, I’ve remained inspired by their passion for storytelling, which brought them across the country.
“There’s this alchemy, bringing together professionals — playwrights, actors, directors,” Mabey mused. “Our different energies will bring something alive.”
My Midwest indoctrination reflexively enlisted a sports analogy: going over the playbook with the coach after the game. They laughed agreeably. “Not only for my own work, but I love hearing the feedback on other people’s work. I’m constantly sharpening my pencil when I hear feedback on a play that isn’t even mine. So, all of that, I’m just so looking forward to.”
Nearly a year since we were able to speak with Lauren Gunderson, the 2024 winner of the festival’s Distinguished Achievement in American Theatre Award, we both still feel in conversation with her via social media and her podcast How to Playwright. Another of last year’s short-play writers, Everett Robert, was clearly inspired by his experience. directing Inge’s “Bus Stop” at Hays Community Theatre, running April 25-27.
Something certainly clicked in me while I sat there amongst my playwriting contemporaries at the New Play Lab: that I am allowed to claim legendary writers as my peers. Take Inge: I could certainly recognize the boyhood complexities of navigating queerness in rural Kansas as our 2024 playwright cohort toured Independence. It felt like I was in his famous midcentury play "Picnic," Americana at every corner.
Now, half a century after Inge’s death, a fleet of creatives collect in the middle of the country because a queer man made a notable career in an industry not (entirely) based in a product or profit. I’m sure more common “wholesome” tropes — youth groups and Friday night lights — exist in Independence, but still, busts celebrating Inge adorn public spaces. Thanks to this man, I’m able to have candid conversations about the arts, humanities, and without tiptoeing around topics such as diversity, equity, and inclusion. These discussions are taking place outside of a coastal city. Without having to leave the state, even.
But years deep into an artistic practice in a rural area with these limp wrists will get you down. Thankfully, Mabey’s voice was just the one I needed to hear when I confided my fear about national and local politics inhibiting me, creatively or otherwise.
“You know, it’s never easy to be creative, because if we’re not struggling with other people about our work, we’re struggling with ourselves about our work," they said. "So basically we’re always struggling to tell authentic and true stories. They’re based in fiction but have such emotional truth. And I feel like right now it could feel even scarier, especially in this country, because there is a lot of division, and I feel like I parallel that division in myself as I struggle with writing my own stories.”
But, they added, “It’s important that I bring my full self where I go, and that’s me in terms of my gender identity, my sexual orientation, my skills and abilities, my faults. I am bringing me. I’m bringing that to my work and to where I am physically. And now, more than ever, it’s important to bring our entire selves.
“And so, as I go back to Independence … I think sometimes there are stereotypes about small towns and about the Midwest. And I am saying I’m bringing me as I return there, and I do that with confidence and joy. I’m excited to be in the environment, with these people, again. The more I bring my authentic self, the more I can do to better the world. So that’s what I’m going to do.”
The root of the word “wholesome” is “health.” Denying entire parts of oneself makes it difficult to find healthy ways to express, connect with, and take care of others. Thank goodness for people like John Mabey. More minds and hearts like theirs will be present at the 42nd annual Inge Fest.
The Details
The 42nd Annual William Inge Theatre Festival
April 17-19, 2025, at Independence Community College in Independence, Kansas
This year's Inge Fest includes performances of Emma Horwitz' "Helens of Troy New York" and staged readings of New Play Lab works. All events are free and open to the public.
Learn more about the William Inge Theater Festival.
Brett Crandall is an actor, writer, producer, puppeteer and LGBTQIA+ activist based in Garden City, Kansas. A graduate of the American Academy of Dramatic Arts-NY, he tours regularly with his puppetry practice, Brett Crandall Studios, with a focus on all-ages, queer-inclusive stories. BrettCrandallStudios.com; @brett_crandall_studios.
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