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

Alright, Katherine thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s talk about innovation. What’s the most innovative thing you’ve done in your career?

After teaching at The Ohio State University for 30 years, I retired and started a new career in the theatre. I liked teaching but theatre is my passion. I think the two groups I started, WOMEN AT PLAY and WILD WOMEN WRITING are the most innovative things I have done in my career, even though they are expensive hobbies rather than money-making businesses.

WOMEN AT PLAY consisted of 10 women (if one dropped out we added another) who wrote plays together. We used a technique developed by one of our members, Cecily O’Neill, which involved improvisations described in her book, DRAMA WORLDS. Early on we decided to put a play on but without money we simply found someone willing to let us use her house. The play was called HOMESCAPE and we took the audience from room to room. Many of the plays we then wrote and performed were site-specific. After the group broke up another formed, WILD WOMEN WRITING, and this group writes on topics which writings I turn into scripts and we do readings, mostly at The Columbus Museum of Art. The group also lets me direct plays I used to teach or find, by such playwrights as Samuel Beckett, Harold Pinter, and David Auburn.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

After retiring from my role as Professor at The Ohio State University, I began a writing group called WOMEN AT PLAY (as opposed to MEN AT WORK). There were 10 women and we wrote plays together, many of which were put on as site specific, whether in a house, a yard, a cafe, or an Aerobics room. I had studied acting and directing in New York, so I became not just the director of the group but also of the plays and I put the scripts together. Sometimes we used a theatre and sometimes added music. When the group broke up after 14 years, I started a new group, WILD WOMEN WRITING. We write on topics (at the moment working on AI) and do a reading of a script I put together, mostly at The Columbus Museum of Art. I also direct other plays, some of which I have written. Daniel Rogers often provided music for WOMEN AT PLAY and Stefan Farrenkopf provides music for WWW, also sometimes performing with us.
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For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

Although I enjoyed teaching very much, I have found my life in my theatre groups more rewarding in many ways. When I taught at OSU, I found being a woman, especially an outspoken woman, challenging to say the least. I got my idea for my two groups from Anne Hall, who had put out a call for playwrights that only women answered. We wrote a play called WOMEN WHO KILL together and I learned much from that experience. The most rewarding aspect of being an artist (writing and directing plays) is bringing to life what both the group(s) and I find in life and feel about life. In making that effort one finds new ways of exploring what your own life and the lives of others are about and that is most rewarding.

Any advice for managing a team?

I am bossy and I find that has helped each of my two creative groups to last as long as they did. A member of my group tried to form her own but she was way too nice and they only lasted a year. I do listen to everyone in the group and take their suggestions into account, but I remain in charge. I also listen to their writing carefully and appreciate all their efforts.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://katherineburkman.wixsite.com/author
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/katherine.h.burkman
• Other: contact [email protected]

Image Credits
pAe as Gertrude Stein photo by David Burkman Picture of David Fawcett and Acacia Duncan by David Burkman