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Gary M. English
A Message from the Artistic Director
 As we move toward the climax of the presidential election, many believe this may be a moment in history when dramatic changes in the direction of our national personality take place. For the last several years, clouds formed over our cultural psyche and this has been expre ssed dramatically on stage and in film. Moral certainty seems elusive as we witness the carnage of Iraq and the Sudan coupled with the random natural disasters such as Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans and the recent flooding throughout the Midwest. Films such as The Departed, There Will Be Blood, No Country For Old Men, and Michael Collins suggest a world where institutions are corrupt or inept and violence is ubiquitous. There seems no recourse for the average person caught up in an inexorable and darkening political and economic decline.
What are we to do, and where are we to look for leadership, or moral clarity?
Despite our darker fears Americans have a resilience that suggests we are at our best just when circumstances are at their worst. Eventually we see things more clearly and I would suggest we find our strength in a few national personality traits that pull us through the most difficult periods. First, one way or the other we search for leaders whose vision and good judgment transcends other limitations. Second, we have the ability to pull together as families and communities and focus on what needs attention. The reality of family has been radically and progressively altered recently. What constitutes a family, a marriage? Who gets to decide what a marriage is? What defines our sense of community? When does our sense of community extend across state lines? When does it extend beyond national lines, or racial lines? When do tribal differences finally give way to national interest or international interest?
Last season, CRT offered a series of plays that focused on the world largely outside our national geography and in Arabian Nights, and Pentecost we found humor and pathos and in The Threepenny Opera, we found the darkness of a corrupt and self serving world. This year as the country determines what may be a new direction for the next decade or more, I can’t help but feel we are progressing toward a more positive, hopeful outlook. Beginning with A Man For All Seasons, we examine the role of conscience in politics as we search for a new definition of national leadership and new hope for our institutional health. Skin Of Our Teeth, pits the American Family against all kinds of disastrous possibilities and Pericles continues the never ending search for reconciliation of family against loss. Finally, the original rock musical Hair, concludes a season that – if things go well – may indeed usher in a new Age of Aquarius.
Come along for the ride. We’ll have to see, together, whether we end up the year on this hopeful note – or not. The ride at least, should not be disappointing.
Gary M. English
Artistic Director
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