Abstract
In 1997 Long Wharf Theatre's newly appointed Artistic Director, Doug Hughes, arrived in New Haven, Connecticut, driven to discover his adopted city's "center of civic energy." 2 This energy seemed absent from a site whose diverse neighborhoods appeared disconnected from each other and from a cohesive sense of urban identity. Theatre, he believed, could draw together the urban community and allow the city to look at itself. 3 Yet, Hughes understood that the historical relationship between New Haven and its professional resident theatres had been as fraught and disconnected as the urban terrain seemed to be. Both the Yale Repertory and the Long Wharf theatres focused their energies on producing classical texts and new works, unreflective of New Haven, and cast mainly with New York actors. In order to begin revising the relationship between the theatre and the city, Hughes decided he needed not only to reflect New Haven via a representational narrative and semiotically resonant production, but also by inviting the city onstage, casting local residents alongside professional actors. And he knew just the company to work with: Cornerstone Theater. [End Page 197]
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