We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Preston Crowder a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Preston, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

I began my MFA program for Playwriting in the Fall of 2019 in New York City. Part of going into this program meant leaving a playwriting program I had entered prior. The program, Tennessee Playwrights Studio, is a Nashville based theater and playwriting program that helps give emerging playwrights the opportunity to workshop and present their work. I was saddened to leave Tennessee Playwrights Studio in lieu of the MFA but it made sense in order to further my training outside of my hometown. One of the first plays I began writing in my program was a little play called, “Don’t Look Black: A Moral Story”, a meditation of race and appropriation in the United States. Interestingly enough, however, during the spring of my first year, the COVID-19 pandemic began to ravage the country. For this reason, I left New York and went back home to Nashville in order to be closer to family while doing a year of my program virtually. While this was heartbreaking, I didn’t realize the types of opportunities that would be able to come out of such an unexpected moment in history.
Since I was able to return home and mostly every program went virtual, I was thankfully able to rejoin the Tennessee Playwrights Studio playwriting cohort, which allowed me the space to further develop the piece “Don’t Look Black”. Through the program, I was able to build a network and support system of artists that helped me dive into and complete the work outside of my Masters program. From the workshop presentations, Tennessee Playwrights Studio eventually decided to take a chance on the show and mount a full production of it in the summer of 2022.
Overall, this experience was one of the most meaningful experiences I’ve had as a playwright because it gave me the chance to fully develop a work and see it completely through from inception to production, which is something that a lot of playwrights don’t always get the opportunity to do. It also allowed me to grow with a theater company such as Tennessee Playwrights Studio, which is imperative to any playwright’s journey. Lastly, this moment will forever be one of the my fondest memories as an artist because it was my very first full-length production ever mounted. And to top it off, it was in my hometown of Nashville, Tennessee. To be able to bring the work from New York back home will forever be a career highlight for me as one of my goals is to build more affordable theater communities in the many places I call home. “Don’t Look Black” will forever be a reminder that it is imperative to seek out and build an artistic community in as many places as you can.

Preston, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I’ve been writing honestly since I can remember. It started with me making original comics for my parents on paper towels, which my Mother hated because that just meant she had to keep buying paper towels. Eventually I received an old laptop and used this laptop to write my own original soap operas. Yes, I was like ten watching soap operas and attempting to make my own. I would post these soap opera stories online, hoping that someone might stumble across it and read it. So, as you can tell, from a very early age I had an itch for creating stories and making content. This itch never really left but continued to develop as I got older. Eventually the writer’s itch led me to songwriting, novel writing, and playwriting in high school. When I began to dive into the craft of playwriting, thanks to my theater teacher at the time, Catherine Coke, I immediately fell in love with the form itself. At the same time, I was also beginning to audition for more theater shows at my high school which led me into acting more. Overall, I became more immersed in the craft of theater making and I knew that there was something about the magic that exists within theater that I was drawn too.
I continued to develop my playwriting skills in as an undergraduate at Oberlin College where I wrote and directed many plays while continuing to grow my skills as a performer.
After graduating from Oberlin, I shifted gears from theater to music for a while, actively pursing a career as an independent musical artist. After doing this for a few years (and having a lot of fun. with it!), I shifted gears once again, went back to my roots, and decided to pursue an MFA in playwriting.
My MFA program has been integral to my ability to continue to be a working artist. During my MFA program, I connected with a lot of amazing collaborators who helped me continue to unlock my artistic sensibilities as Black, Queer playwright. I began to become more poignant in what messages and stories I wanted audiences to sit with. My MFA gave me the space and room to work on music and audition as an actor as well. I began to understand how all of these artistic outlets flow together and as an artist I began to find ways to allow them to bleed and feed one another. A few months after finishing my program, I returned to Oberlin College but this time as a professor teaching subjects ranging from Playwriting, Acting, and even Rap Performance.
As a professor, I am now blessed to to use the things I’ve learned to help other budding artists find their footing in a constantly changing industry. I am now in a place where I can also better understand the term “working-artist”. As I teach, I am constantly also finding ways to further my own artistic growth. Recent examples of this include public reading of my new play “BOCKING” by The New Group in New York City during the summer of 2023 and directing “At The Wake of A Dead Drag Queen” at Cleveland’s Dobama Theater in the winter of 2024. My main focus continues to centered on how to build and grow artistic communities while providing content for audiences that specifically focuses on the stories and lives of marginalized groups in this country, particularly Black, Queer people.

Have you ever had to pivot?

I think being an artist, the name of the game is pivot. Something that has helped me to stay afloat as an artist and also just a human in this often crazy world is understanding that I am not pigeonholed to one form of artistry. I am mainly a Playwright (by training) but I’ve always made it a point to dip my toe into every artistic venture I could find. Whether it be acting, directing, making music, or even helping to build sets, I think one of the best things I’ve done for myself is to find the overlap in all of these artistic practices. It’s been important to be able to pivot from one to the other because at times the writing gigs may be not be coming in, but I may be able to direct or act in the meantime. Or there have been times where I’ve had to direct or act in my own work. I think no matter what, an artists job is to always find ways to exercise those artistic muscles. That could be within the thing you’re mostly trained for or it may not, but not being afraid to shift and pivot is vital in my opinion. Outside of this, I’ve also gone from working a well-paying artistic job to working a minimum wage job within months of each other. I think understanding that the artistic journey has ebbs and flows that can’t always be controlled makes the mental task of pivoting a bit easier.

Is there something you think non-creatives will struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can provide some insight – you never know who might benefit from the enlightenment.

I think often people who have not decided to dedicate a life and career to the arts lack an understanding of what that actually means in a long-term sense of things. Because of the hyper-celebrity culture of our society, there is a tendency to uplift and praise artists who have reached a certain celebrity or mainstream success. Artists who don’t fall into those things can often be seen as “unsuccessful” or “not a true artist” because they’re not on television or making huge bucks like some of their artistic peers. Not all artists are going to reach a certain level of fame or even make a lot of money pursuing and staying connected to the arts. I think most artists will understand and agree that success is defined on their own terms, but too often the pressures of our society will make artists feel like unless they’re on television or Broadway, that their contributions are not as important. As a society, we have to continue to uplift and support artists who may still be finding their footing. This means financially supporting local and community artists This means congratulating playwrights for writing even when they’re not being produced. This means giving love to actors who are auditioning but may not be booking. This means celebrating painters who are constantly working at their craft but having a hard time making sells. Artists need the most love and support when they are struggling to break through and I think too often people don’t want to validate an artist until they’ve “made it” without understanding that “making it” isn’t always the point of the artists’ journey.

Contact Info:

• Website: prestoncrowder.net
• Instagram: pennedbypreston
• Youtube: Fame Walking

Image Credits
-Nathaniel Johnson Photography -Natalie Powers & The New Group NYC -Andre Patton Photography