14/48 broke in its new digs at the Broadway Performance Hall last weekend and it felt like the world's quickest theater festival was getting... big.
This is the first 14/48 (where 14 new shorts are written, rehearsed, and performed in 48 hours) since the festival announced its mildly controversial move from Consolidated Works to Broadway Performance Hall in April. At the time, the steering committee sent a letter to participants, pointing to the sudden dismissal of ConWorks Executive Director (and 14/48 steering committee member) Matthew Richter and a subsequent communication breakdown as reasons for changing lodgings. Steering committee member Shawn Belyea said Broadway Performance Hall offered a larger capacity and a better location. Broadway Performance Hall is also "accepting at least a part of the financial risk for the event," Belyea said.
The move also sparked worry that the festival, whose charm has partly depended on riotousness and unpredictability, would suffocate in the stuffier atmosphere of a plush theater where you can't slosh your drink wherever you like. "We could act like we owned the place," one participant said of ConWorks. "This feels like you've got to tuck in your shirt a little—but that isn't a bad thing."
Everyone at the festival stood a little straighter. I arrived early, sat in the lobby, and watched the final moments of preparation before the audience arrived. The bartenders asked where drinkers could take their booze. "On this floor and in the beer garden outside," an organizer advised. "But not up the stairs."
"Can they go all the way over there?" a bartender asked.
"They can go there," another organizer pointed. "But not over there."
"So this isn't a ConWorks bar," another bartender laughed.
Festival regulars peered around as they walked through the doors, sizing up the new space. The lobby chatter seemed a little more professional and kiss-kiss than I remembered: "So good to see you" and "I love your work." With a stellar lineup and the high stakes of a new venue, the plays were more consistently entertaining than they've been in recent years. Last weekend (the first of two) also broke attendance records.
"I was a little scared and a little nostalgic for our old space," Belyea said. "But it was great—all the things we love about 14/48 are still there."
14/48 is growing outwards as well. The first international 14/48 is set to premiere in England in October and Shanga Parker, steering committee member and UW professor, will teach a speed-theater class next spring based on the 14/48 model.
Whatever anxieties bubbled up after the move from ConWorks can be laid to rest—if 14/48 is getting bigger, it's also getting better. ■
