UA PLAYWRIGHT AN EMERGING VOICE IN AMERICAN THEATRE

FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. - When she gets up in the morning, Jean Hedgecock says the first thing she thinks about is writing. She is determined to create plays that will be heard and staged in an industry in which only 1% of the plays produced in the U.S. are by women.

In addition to full-length productions, Hedgecock is adept at creating 10-minute plays, haikus for the stage that are becoming increasingly popular in theatres around the country. "Communion," comprised of three of her short plays, was staged by the Pulse Ensemble Theatre in New York in January 2002. Another short play, "The Corner Table at Cafe Noir," was staged in November by The Lion Theatre in New York as part of Yearning for the 4th Grade, a production consisting of a series of smaller plays knit together by a narrative that Streetlight Productions commissioned Hedgecock to write. "Communion" also will be staged at The William Inge Theatre in Kansas this spring as part of The Anna Plays.

"In Yearning, we explore the difficulty of making a human connection in a world that has become so complicated. We are always pressed for time, for money, pressed to compete, to deliver, to achieve, to win, to be recognized as a person of value, to have the consolation that somebody cares," said Hedgecock.

Hedgecock, an MFA student who teaches playwriting to undergraduates in the Fulbright College drama department, has an impressive list of credits. She was invited to the Edward Albee Last Frontier Festival in Alaska in June 2002, as the winner of the 2002 Pregnant Chad New Play Contest for her work "Resurrection." A new play, "Genuflection," will be published in Confrontation in 2003, while "Damnation" appeared in the 2002 edition of Poems and Plays.

In an age when the American audience wants to be entertained, when helicopters landing on stage and swimming pools used for sets have become blasé, Hedgecock said it’s difficult to write something that is meaningful as well as artistic and entertaining.

"In addition to competing with film and television and the short attention spans that have caused the 10-minute play to become so popular, I have to fight to have my voice heard in a male-dominated industry," she said.

In her works, Hedgecock is preoccupied by the manner in which women allow themselves to be defined by others. Her latest play, It’s Raining Men, centers on a mother who fears her daughter will become a social outcast unless she chooses a husband.

"The daughter, however, sees marriage as an institution that was organized around and reinforces a fundamentally oppressive biological condition, what John Stuart Mill called the 'primitive state of slavery,’ " said Hedgecock.

She came to the U of A in 2002 to study poetry with Miller Williams, but while studying drama with Roger Gross, she discovered her talents as a playwright.

"Her plays are poetic. She truly has a magic touch," said Gross. "She has exceeded all our expectations. Others work for years for this kind of recognition."

Hedgecock said she tells stories in the hope that sharing common experiences will not only comfort others, but also impel them to create solutions for improving their lives.

"I received a letter recently from an audience member who said he never realized the way he thought about his life, that he planned to rethink his life. That’s the most you can hope for as a writer," Hedgecock said. "Also, so many things don’t make sense to me, so I write to come to terms with those things — to create a space where order can be restored."