AMERICAN THEATER
dir. Nicholas Clark & Dylan Frederick
2025 • 83 minutes
CHATTANOOGA FILM FESTIVAL REVIEW
by: Ben Kaye at BenKayeWords
If WAITING FOR GUFFMAN’s Corky St. Clair suddenly joined the MAGA movement, you’d start to get a sense of the bizarre character that is Brian Clowdus, the de-facto “star” of Nicholas Clark & Dylan Frederick’s AMERICAN THEATER, a frighteningly enthralling work of documentary filmmaking. Clowdus, an acclaimed director at central Georgia’s Serenbe Playhouse, has found himself on hard times after a recent slate of toxic accusations - running the gamut from racist comments, to inappropriate sexual advances, to creating incredibly unsafe work environments - has left him outcast from his theatermaking community. However, Clowdus is attempting to make his comeback with an original devised piece (performed in an immersive, promenade staging) centered around, what else, the Salem Witch Trials.
Clowdus, having transformed into a full-throated Trump supporter following his “cancellation,” has gathered an ensemble of eager, fellow Conservative-minded thespians to help bring his fractured vision to life. His fellow collaborators all decry “woke” culture and the horrors of the liberal agenda, all the while working to master the art of theater, a medium arguably built upon the tenets of liberalism and empathy. It’s incredibly easy to find some guilty pleasure in laughing at the foibles and ludicrousness of Clowdus’ work, especially as various technical issues and overwrought staging decisions leave “The Salem Experience” as something of a mess by the run’s end.
But the unique strength of Clark & Frederick’s work is - perhaps ironically - their unabashedly empathetic lens with which they capture these right-wing artists, never asking us to laugh at them, only to attempt to understand why they’re doing what they’re doing, and letting us be the ultimate arbiters of what it means to try and build community within a self-imposed chamber of political isolation. AMERICAN THEATER emerges as one of the most potent texts about contemporary conservatism you’ll find today, proving that no matter where one falls on the political compass, as Brian Clowdus says, “What a gift to be out here in the middle of the woods with a bunch of crazy people making art.”