New leader helps OKC theater emerge from pandemic with 'Reboot Season'

Kelly Kerwin has personal experience with the life-changing nature of theater.

After all, it happened to her the first time she saw the musical "Hedwig and the Angry Inch."

"That was the night I was like, 'This is what I want to do with my life,'" she recalled. "It hit different because that was when I was 16. So before that, I would see like 'Fiddler on the Roof,' and I liked it. Then when I saw this, I was like, 'Oh my gosh, this is about identity and who you are. This is about who you're meant to be.' ... And my mind was blown. It was just like, 'I didn't know theater could do this.'"

Kerwin's ability to deal with change and willingness to explore what theater can do have been particularly vital this year as she started a new job in a new city working for a venerable theater that, like so many others, is facing new challenges in the midst of an ongoing global pandemic.

In July, Kerwin quietly made her entrance as the new artistic director of Oklahoma City Repertory Theatre, an award-winning regional theater newly nicknamed OKC Rep (a change from the previous moniker CityRep). A recent transplant from New York City, she is just the second artistic director in the professional theater's 20-year history and recently announced three shows for OKC Rep's spring 2022 "Reboot Season," which will be the company's first performances since autumn 2019.

"I'm trying to embrace the freedom where it's like, 'Well, it's all a little nuts right now — for me, for the city, for the world, for theater — so let's just throw it at the wall and hope it sticks. So, it is a little freeing — when I'm not riddled with anxiety," Kerwin said with a chuckle.

Newcomer follows OKC theater's founding artistic director

Selected in spring after a nationwide search that attracted more than 65 qualified candidates, Kerwin succeeds Founding Artistic Director Donald Jordan, who announced his retirement in fall 2020. After leading Oklahoma City Repertory Theatre for 24 years, Jordan assumed the role of artistic director emeritus over the summer.

"I think the next 20 years will be even greater. Kelly and I have become friends, and I have great faith in her and the next generation. She's smarter, faster, younger, better," said Jordan, who has since become head of production for Circle Theatre in Fort Worth, Texas.

Oklahoma City Repertory Theatre was officially established in 2001 and produced its first play in 2002. It has been honored by the American Theatre Wing, Actors' Equity Association and Oklahoma Arts Council and helped OETA win a regional Emmy for its broadcast of the theater's 2014 production of “The Grapes of Wrath."

"Coming to Oklahoma City after a founder retired, that's a whole case study that we learn about in grad school. ... The best-case scenario is that the theater continues to live and go (on), and most of the time, that's what the founder wants as well. Thankfully, I was in a situation where Donald Jordan wanted that, and he's been very supportive about passing that torch to me," Kerwin said, sitting down with The Oklahoman in OKC Rep's new offices on Automobile Alley.

"Many of the people I've talked to have said, 'Oh, that's where I would go to see the cool plays.' ... Great, well, it's gonna still be the place where you can come see the cool plays. That's what I'm hoping to bring with my vision."

New artistic director comes to OKC from NYC

Originally from Springfield, Missouri, Kerwin comes to Oklahoma City from New York City, where she was the associate producer for The Public Theater’s Under the Radar Festival. She also worked as a line producer for plays and musicals in The Public’s five performance spaces and was co-leader for The Public’s Devised Theater Working Group.

"I produced new plays and musicals on the main stage: Some of those transferred to Broadway; some of those ended up on Pulitzer Prize short lists," said Kerwin, who produced the Broadway show "Girl from the North Country" as well as David Henry Hwang's acclaimed "Soft Power."

"But I also did the Under the Radar Festival, which is the experimental theater and international theater. So, I feel like that really defines who I am: I have this high standard of what I want theater to look like and be, which is just the best version of itself that speaks to a lot of different people."

Kerwin earned her bachelor of fine arts from the DePaul University theater school and her master's degree from the Yale School of Drama. She has been on the artistic staff at Yale Repertory Theater, Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Atlantic Theater Company, The House Theatre of Chicago and Chicago’s Collaboraction.

"I have a BFA and MFA and dramaturgy, which I think kind of just shows that I don't fit in a box, because I gravitated towards the education that allowed me to study a really broad sense of what theater can look like and be," she said.

"I'm somebody that thinks of theater as a place for everyone."

'The Reboot Season' includes three spring 2022 shows

Kerwin has hired two new OKC Rep staffers: General Manager Jericha Bickell, who recently worked as an event coordinator for the former Cox Convention Center and Chesapeake Energy Arena (the latter is now Paycom Center), and Production Manager Laurena Sherrill, who most recently helped Arts Council Oklahoma City produce its long-running Festival of the Arts.

"They're local, which is even more amazing," Kerwin said. "They've been instrumental in helping get anything off the ground."

Earlier this month, Kerwin unveiled a lineup of three early 2022 shows for "The Reboot Season." They will be the first performances for OKC Rep since the company staged Lucas Hnath's Tony-winning hit "A Doll's House, Part 2" in November 2019. The theater canceled the second half of its 2019-2020 season in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and has remained dark since.

“Kelly Kerwin’s arrival as the new artistic director for OKC Rep has provided a wonderful sense of renewal as we work to come out of the COVID era," board president Cliff Hudson told The Oklahoman in an email. "Her rich experience and strong national connections to the theater community have already resulted in fresh and creative programming for this reboot season."

Since OKC Rep's primary venue — the Civic Center Music Hall's Freede Little Theater — is undergoing a full remodel, the company will present its first two spring shows — "An Evening with an Immigrant" by Inua Ellams on Jan. 22-23 and "Piano Tales" by James & JJJJJerome on March 31-April 2 — at Oklahoma Contemporary Arts Center's Te Ata Theater.

"Kelly is an incredible addition to the creative community of Oklahoma. While her academic training is elite and her career forged in the high-flying milieu of New York, Kelly’s artistic impulses are democratic and grounded in community," said Oklahoma Contemporary Artistic Director Jeremiah Matthew Davis in an email. "Our team at Oklahoma Contemporary is thrilled to partner with Kelly and the new OKC Rep."

Innovative audio tour coming in spring

A Nigerian-born poet playwright and performer now based in the UK, Ellams will present his one-man show "An Evening with an Immigrant" through The Public Theater's new "Under the Radar: On the Road" initiative before bringing it to OKC.

With their "Piano Tales," NYC-based musical storytellers James Harrison Monaco and JJJJJerome Ellis let the audience choose which tales from their repertoire will be told each performance by selecting objects from a trunk. That means every show is different.

"I'm hoping that nothing happens that we would ever have to cancel — of course, health and safety above all else — but they are easier lifts technically. The second show is something that has been done in people's living rooms, it's been done outside, and it's also been done at some amazing theaters," Kerwin said.

"It's the spirit of just (being) forward-thinking and cutting-edge, like let's make things that I really feel that the community will respond to, that will resonate with the community, but also, that people here have maybe never seen before — plays that haven't been produced here, artists that have never come here."

For OKC Rep's May production, Kerwin and New York playwright Emily Zemba will collaborate with the artist collective Listen and Breathe to create "Of a Mind: Oklahoma City," described as "a guided audio experience designed especially for Oklahoma City’s increasingly vibrant urban core." The innovative project will incorporate original music by Kevin McNamara with movement direction by local choreographer Hui Cha Poos.

"This is a way to just be able to find more experiences to gather together and hang out with like-minded theater people — or unlike-minded theater people or people who maybe just want to do something a little different," Kerwin said.

"I really was passionate about trying to find ways to bring in and amplify voices from a more diverse world and community because Oklahoma City is wildly diverse. There's so many different communities here, and I'm hoping to find a way that we can all come together to have conversations and experience art together."

Oklahoma City Repertory Theatre's 'Spring 2022 — The Reboot Season'

•"An Evening with an Immigrant": Jan. 22-23, Oklahoma Contemporary Arts Center's Te Ata Theater.

•"Piano Tales": March 31-April, Oklahoma Contemporary's Te Ata Theater.

•"Of a Mind: Oklahoma City": May (specific dates to be announced) in downtown OKC.

Information: www.okcrep.org.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: New leader helps OKC theater emerge from pandemic with 'Reboot Season'