ABSTRACT
In the course of what is still a relatively brief history of feminist criticism in theatre, much has been written about work that originated in a woman-run performance space in New York called the WOW Cafe.1 As a collective endeavor, WOW (Women’s One World) has no single artistic vision guiding its productions; at base it is a producing organization that allows members of its collective to showcase work. The result is a wide range of offerings each season representing enormously disparate production types and performance styles. WOW is as much a community as it is a theatre and because any member of the collective can produce and perform-including women with no previous training or experience in theatre-shows at WOW vary as much in quality as they do in approach. WOW might be considered a kind of preeminent community theatre, which is not to suggest that its importance lies primarily in its sociology. Some of the most significant feminist theatre of the last decade was created by women who started at WOW and most of these women continue to work there.
