Showing September 11-13, 2026 at Parkway Playhouse. This festival will feature staged readings of new plays written by Appalachian Playwrights or plays that represent Appalachian Culture in some way. One script from this festival will be chosen to be produced in our 2027 Mainstage Season!
OUR MISSION
When Parkway Playhouse was founded in 1947, it was founded out of a love of theater and dedication to education as college students joined together from around the nation here in our mountain town to produce high-quality productions each summer.
What they found here was not only the knowledge of how to create wonderful theater; but also, farmers harvesting crops at the end of each season, teaching them the value of hard work; potters, quilters, and cloggers showing them the power art can have on a community; and a town thriving in the Blue Ridge Mountains because of the people that cherish it and each other, teaching them how to be good neighbors.
Students from all those years ago and the audiences who pass through our doors today all found a special feeling of community here at Parkway Playhouse. The secret ingredient? Our home. The impact of our people and our location here in the Appalachian Mountains is keenly felt in our theater.
Appalachia is defined as a cultural region in the Eastern United States that stretches from the southern tier of New York State to northern Alabama and Georgia. It’s an area rich in tradition, ideals, and culture. The Appalachian Playwriting Festival is a celebration of Appalachian Culture. It is a preservation of the stories, people and traditions that make our community so wonderful. This festival is an opportunity to give back by offering a microphone to those voices telling the stories of our home and heart.
Each year submitted plays by Appalachian playwrights will be read by a committee of local community members and theater industry professionals, and the favorite select handful will be given staged readings. These previously unpublished works will all celebrate Appalachian Culture. The readings will be adjudicated and the winning script will be fully produced on our stage. Appalachian stories deserve to be told and we’re so excited to provide this opportunity for those with stories to tell.
DONATE
Your donations help us produce this event, pay artists, and connect with our community. Click here to donate today.
JOIN OUR TEAM
We’re looking for festival volunteers, musicians, readers, and more! Email us at [email protected] to get the conversation started!
BUY TICKETS
Your attendance at this event means we can produce more events like this in the future.
Showing September 11-13, 2026 at Parkway Playhouse. This festival will feature staged readings of new plays written by Appalachian Playwrights or plays that represent Appalachian Culture in some way. One script from this festival will be chosen to be produced in our 2027 Mainstage Season!
2025 FESTIVAL WINNER
CARSWELL HOLLER
BY TRAVIS LOWE
When a traveling EPA agent stops in for a bite at a greasy spoon café in southern West Virginia’s coal country, it sets off a series of dangerous events and menacing stories, both real and imagined, natural and supernatural. A comedically elegant and broodingly dark celebration of Appalachia and its ghosts.
Travis Lowe is a nationally recognized playwright, whose works include Oxalis, Sixteen Years Tried, Mixed Fandango, Six Knots, Some Notes On Dating During Outbreak, and Recycled Nuts. His plays have been developed and produced by The Magnetic Theatre, Different Strokes! Performing Arts Collective, Multiverse Theatre Collective, Haywood Arts Regional Theatre, Sublime Theatre and Press, and the Montford Park Players. Travis’s picaresque prequel to Twelfth Night, The Humourous Adventures of Sir Andrew Aguecheek, was shortlisted for the Shakespeare’s New Contemporaries Project, and his darkly comedic dive into immigration history, Glister Doves and Gopher Wood, was a finalist for the Princess Grace Foundation’s Playwriting Fellowship. He is a member of The Dramatists Guild of America and currently resides in Asheville, NC with his wife, two parrots, and an enviable collection of kitchen spices.
OUR MISSION
When Parkway Playhouse was founded in 1947, it was founded out of a love of theater and dedication to education as college students joined together from around the nation here in our mountain town to produce high-quality productions each summer.
What they found here was not only the knowledge of how to create wonderful theater; but also, farmers harvesting crops at the end of each season, teaching them the value of hard work; potters, quilters, and cloggers showing them the power art can have on a community; and a town thriving in the Blue Ridge Mountains because of the people that cherish it and each other, teaching them how to be good neighbors.
Students from all those years ago and the audiences who pass through our doors today all found a special feeling of community here at Parkway Playhouse. The secret ingredient? Our home. The impact of our people and our location here in the Appalachian Mountains is keenly felt in our theater.
Appalachia is defined as a cultural region in the Eastern United States that stretches from the southern tier of New York State to northern Alabama and Georgia. It’s an area rich in tradition, ideals, and culture. The Appalachian Playwriting Festival is a celebration of Appalachian Culture. It is a preservation of the stories, people and traditions that make our community so wonderful. This festival is an opportunity to give back by offering a microphone to those voices telling the stories of our home and heart.
Each year submitted plays by Appalachian playwrights will be read by a committee of local community members and theater industry professionals, and the favorite select handful will be given staged readings. These previously unpublished works will all celebrate Appalachian Culture. The readings will be adjudicated and the winning script will be fully produced on our stage. Appalachian stories deserve to be told and we’re so excited to provide this opportunity for those with stories to tell.
SUPPORT APPALACHIAN STORIES
DONATE
Your donations help us produce this event, pay artists, and connect with our community. Click here to donate today.
JOIN OUR TEAM
We’re looking for festival volunteers, musicians, readers, and more! Email us at [email protected] to get the conversation started!
BUY TICKETS
Your attendance at this event means we can produce more events like this in the future. Grab your tickets here!
“I found the whole festival experience wonderful and am particularly grateful to Cheyenne, Marci, Jaquie, and Mara for your warm welcome and support of my play. Parkway Playhouse is a powerhouse.”
“I loved the people I worked with and how we talked in depth about the show.”
“I had such a blast this past weekend, and it was wonderful getting to meet all of you. I also fell quite in love with the town of Burnsville. Thank you again for making it such a fantastic experience.”
“It means a great deal to me to know that Minister of Sorrow has found a wonderful home away from home at Parkway Playhouse and will be produced.”
“I found the whole festival experience wonderful and am particularly grateful to Cheyenne, Marci, Jaquie, and Mara for your warm welcome and support of my play. Parkway Playhouse is a powerhouse.”
“I loved the people I worked with and how we talked in depth about the show.”
“I had such a blast this past weekend, and it was wonderful getting to meet all of you. I also fell quite in love with the town of Burnsville. Thank you again for making it such a fantastic experience.”
“It means a great deal to me to know that Minister of Sorrow has found a wonderful home away from home at Parkway Playhouse and will be produced.”