Singing, dancing and acting by the students of CWU at Short Works Festival

Alahnna Connolly Staff Reporter

Scripts, designs, characters and staging, all completely organized by CWU students, brought the Short Works Festival to life last weekend. The festival was a three-day long event from Feb. 16 -18 and took almost a year to plan.

There were four student-written plays featured: “A Fine Upstanding Lad: A New Musical” written by Shawn Mulligan and Maverick McCarl, “The Maiden” written by Caelyn White, “Dream of the Butterfly” written by Miles Baker, “The Good, the Tired, the Hungry” written by Peter James and “Body Bag” written by Mason Saulsbury.

The main festival creative team producers were Kathryn Stahl, Jason Tucholke and Lirit Pendell.

Junior tourism and event major Keteya Woodfroff said, “I can’t wait to see more student led plays, the creativity was amazing and the plays were very unique.”

Mason Saulsbury, the scriptwriter for “Body Bag,” said she thinks it’s important for student run productions to be featured on campus.

“It’s a showcase of raw talent that the students here have, something that isn’t only a licensed work, but something that was built from the ground up from people that go here,” Saulsbury said.

Jason Tucholke, one of the producers of the events, said he thinks the Short Works Festival is important because it’s entirely student run.

“Each of the shows they do is important because it is produced, designed and directed by the students,” Tucholke said.

According to Tucholke, the performers had been rehearsing since the beginning of the quarter.

According to Saulsbury, she didn’t do any theater productions until she came to CWU, and had only recently begun her work in CWU theater. Saulsbury said the experience of working with everyone else in her production was unique.

“It was really cool to see something I wrote turn into something

I could watch,” Saulsbury said. “Being able to collaborate with such amazing people like Isacc, Jess, Megan and Elizabeth [was cool] as well.”

According to Saulsbury, who went to every showing of the festi- val over the weekend, the opening night turnout was good, and attendance for the other showings was also high.