For Coconut Grove-based playwright and producer William Hector, a theater festival in the neighborhood was no coincidence. A love for the arts and community, bred in the Grove, set him off on a lifelong path in theater.
In college, he realized it was easier to get people to watch a show in nontraditional spaces. They seemed more familiar, more community-centered.
So, after years of making connections in the South Florida arts community, Hector brought his dream for the Coconut Grove Theater Festival to life — bringing local talent to local audiences.
Hector spoke with WLRN's All Things Considered anchor Helen Acevedo ahead of the second annual festival, which runs April 16019.
The interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
How did you come up with the idea for the festival in the first place?
Realizing the amount of theater talent in Miami and realizing that the kind of a vision for theater in the modern day is dynamic new works, 'cause that's something that really draws people in, especially in Miami, where people want to see — you know, it's amazing all the theater happening around the country — but we're a very quirky city.
So I think that, you know, we really appreciate Florida and South Florida storytelling, and so that—and then doing theater in an accessible place. It's not putting theater as this out-of-reach destination, both artistically in terms of the subject matter and also physically. It's putting it in a place where people can come to it and be part of this community fabric.
And then with the Women's Club, I actually—so Irene Monroe, her, um, arts and culture, who was the first one I planned this with—and it was sort of talking about doing maybe a reading there that I was like, you know, Irene, I've kind of had this dream of a theater festival, of really supporting the entire theater community of writers and directors in South Florida, and she loved it in pretty much every step of the way, from talking to the president of the Women's Club, Eileen Davila, who's amazing, to the full arts and culture committee, to the full club.
It was pretty much everyone like, yes, we love this. So I think that it was in the air. I think all of us were ready, and especially with the Playhouse, I think whenever I would talk to people about theater, they'd be like, and what's happening at the Playhouse? There's this real sensibility of The Grove should be the hub for the arts.
Tell us a little bit about the plays the festival has lined up this year and what audiences can expect from them.
We have eight plays total, and it's an array of plays ranging from art history to Miami history, yoruba fables, family drama, a farce set in 1960s Havana, plays within a play set around 17th-century British scandals.
And we also have our first children's matinee, with two plays about history, Bread and William the Hippo, taking place at 2:00 p.m. Saturday. So for audiences of all ages, whatever topics you're interested in, the CGT Fest has something for you.
A majority, if not all performers, playwrights, and directors involved in this event are from South Florida. What process do you go through to select these plays, and how important is it that these are local artists and performers?
So one of the things we did this year was an open submissions call, and one of the key things was ties to South Florida, and that can mean people who are living here now and writing.
But we also included people who are living elsewhere but are from here originally. Part of it's also calling these artists home that might have left Miami when there wasn't these venues for new works, to be like, hey, we're building these venues now, you know? Um, there's the opportunity for Miami-born writers to have their work done in Miami.
The other thing that's kind of key about each play as well is that they're so different, but they're so specifically Miami, and that's, I think, what people want the most. I think that those hyper-specific stories born out of true passion —you get that from Miami writers — 'cause ultimately we're not making a rational choice to be theater artists in Miami.
We're doing it because we love it.
How important was it to include plays for kids, and what kind of impact do you think that'll make?
I think it'll have a huge impact. I think for most people, you need to see art to become an artist, and so there's the importance of that, of starting kids off. But I think, you know, one of the big things with the festival is broadening the audience to not just the arts world, but to everyone, to the entire community, because it speaks to something important.
Not every one of those kids will become an artist, but I think that art will enrich every one of those kids' lives. We just need to make sure that it's available for them.
IF YOU GO
What: Coconut Grove Theater Festival
When: April 16-19
Where: Woman's Club of Coconut Grove, 2985 S Bayshore Dr, Coconut Grove, FL 33133
More information? Click here
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