We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Jeff Desautels. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Jeff below.

Jeff, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you talk to us about a project that’s meant a lot to you?

In 2022, my friend and colleague Amica Hunter and I decided to produce a mini-horror theatre festival in Portland, Oregon. We were inspired by the Twin Cities Horror Festival, and we both happened to be working on spooky-adjacent material. We knew other folks in town that would round out a weekend of performances, and named it Stage Fright. Last year, we went even bigger with two weekends, and we managed to capture a really special energy that I am excited to keep carrying.

This year, we are “coming out”, as it were, and explicitly calling ourselves a queer horror festival. I think our hesitancy in claiming this from the get-go is that it is hard enough to find people doing horror theatre, never mind queer horror theatre. As it turns out, the Venn diagram is a circle. Someone on the internet [https://www.dreadcentral.com/editorials/402352/the-history-of-horror-is-the-history-of-queerness/] made the argument that all horror is queer, and I have to agree. We have a built a little community, and it feels like what a lot of people are searching for. I am excited for the festival to draw a lot of people “back to the theatre”, as it were, and to also make room for different experiences in that space.

Jeff, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

My creative work is in theatre, and I perform and produce original work, often collaborating with others. My background is in devised physical theatre and clowning, which I incorporate into most of what I do. I trained at the Dell’Arte School for Physical Theatre. From there, I formed a company called Box of Clowns in Portland, and we have toured all over the world and performed on America’s Got Talent, The Gong Show, and other performances. Some of my other favorite projects have been performing with Fou Fou Ha, Sir Cupcake’s Queer Circus, and the Clown Cohort at CoHo Theatre. I perform drag under the name Mysteria. I also teach, and have led the Intergenerational Queer Theatre Project with Oregon Children’s Theatre in partnership with the local chapter of SAGE, which is an advocacy group for LGBTQ elders.

My main creative focus at the moment is producing the Stage Fright Festival, which is the world’s only queer horror theatre festival, taking place in Portland, Oregon every October.

Can you tell us about a time you’ve had to pivot?

After a summer of basically touring and performing nonstop, I realized that performing full-time was not actually something I enjoyed. I have loved theatre all my life, and still do, but to be on stage more days than not is, for me, very draining. I greatly admire folks who have the stamina to do long show runs. When I realized this, I kind of felt like a failure since performing full-time was, I thought, the ultimate goal for me, and I had worked really hard to achieve that. I had to teach myself that just because I did not or could not earn my whole income from performing did not mean I was not an artist, or successful, or creating art that was “less-than”. On the contrary, performing less gave me room to explore other ways to engage with theatre, like producing and teaching.

Have any books or other resources had a big impact on you?

I am currently in an MBA program for nonprofit management, and in the midst of forming these frameworks myself, but I have been greatly inspired by a few things. One is “Doughnut Economics” by Kate Raworth. I would recommend it to other creatives in business as she does an amazing job breaking down economic concepts in a useful way, explaining the common wisdom around the economy and why it is wrong, and laying out a path forward that gives one hope that we could actually dethrone late-stage capitalism.

As for my managerial philosophy, I need to recommend “Emergent Strategy” by adrienne maree brown. She covers a lot of ground by relating organizational concepts to patterns in nature. There is a lot of knowledge and wisdom around leadership, change management, and other topics in systems thinking that I think is essential for anyone leading an organization.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.stagefrightfestival.com
• Instagram: @biblicallyaccuratejeff

Image Credits
First solo shot: Solo shot: Robi Arce; Three clowns in studio: Cameron Gee; Three clowns on stage: Marico Fayre; Morgue photo: Anthony Arnista