Career

Stanley Keyes began his theatre

Theatre

Theatre is a collaborative form of fine art that uses live performers to present the experience of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place. The performers may communicate this experience to the audience through combinations of gesture, speech, song, music or dance...

 career in Baltimore

Baltimore

Baltimore is the largest independent city in the United States and the largest city and cultural center of the US state of Maryland. The city is located in central Maryland along the tidal portion of the Patapsco River, an arm of the Chesapeake Bay. Baltimore is sometimes referred to as Baltimore...

 performing various roles at Theatre Hopkins in the early 1970s. It did not take long for him to become associated with Corner Theatre ETC

Corner Theatre ETC

Corner Theatre E.T.C. was an American experimental theater in operation from 1968–1987, a not-for-profit cultural organization located in Baltimore, Maryland, which provided resources for new playwrights, designers, directors, actors, dancers, and other artists seeking alternative means and...

, an experimental theatre

Experimental theatre

Experimental theatre is a general term for various movements in Western theatre that began in the late 19th century as a retraction against the dominant vent governing the writing and production of dramatical menstrophy, and age in particular. The term has shifted over time as the mainstream...

 also located in Baltimore, where he continued acting as well as trying his hand at directing and, ultimately, writing plays. In 1975, his first play The Exorcism was performed as part of an evening of one-acts. This was followed up with a full-length play entitled Oil Rich in Mosby, which was noted for the richness of its dialogue. During this time, Keyes continued as both an actor and director, appearing in such works as Tiger Skin and Margeurite, and staging the highly idiosyncratic Gangsters, by Tom Thorton, first at Towson University

Towson University

Towson University, often referred to as TU or simply Towson for short, is a public university located in Towson in Baltimore County, Maryland, U.S...

's theatre department and then at Corner Theatre.

In 1983, Keyes appeared at New York's Theatre Off Park in an off-Broadway production of The Water Hen by Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz

Stanislaw Ignacy Witkiewicz

Stanisław Ignacy Witkiewicz, a.k.a. "Witkacy" was a Polish playwright, novelist, painter, photographer and philosopher.-Life:...

, under the direction of Brad Mays

Brad Mays

Brad Mays is an independent filmmaker and stage director, living and working in Los Angeles, California.-Background and education:...

. Shortly thereafter, he went to work on a screenplay with the working title of The Return of Grayson Porterhouse. In 1987, the finished script went into production with the new title Stage Fright

Stage Fright (1989)

Stage Fright is an independent feature film produced and directed by Brad Mays and written by Stanley Keyes. It was director Mays' debut film, and it had its premier screening at the 1989 Berlin International Film Festival under the auspices of the New York Foundation for the Arts.It is a...

, again with Mays directing. The independent feature film premiered at the Berlin International Film Festival

Berlin International Film Festival

The Berlin International Film Festival , also called the Berlinale, is one of the world's leading film festivals and most reputable media events. It is held in Berlin, Germany. Founded in West Berlin in 1951, the festival has been celebrated annually in February since 1978...

 in 1989.

In March 2000, Stanley Keyes' play Dragon Slayers was presented in Hollywood, California

California

California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...

, where it ran for six weeks.

Related Articles & Misc.

• Theatre World, Vol. #40 (1983–1984)
• "American Independents in Berlin" - The Edge Berlin's Largest English Language Newspaper, Issue 8, February 16-March 1

External links

• Online Reproduction of Steve Yeager's article (w/ links to photographs) about Corner Theatre "The Corner Theatre as a Cultural Oasis: Or will Yosemite Sam Find Happiness In The Vast Sahara Desert?"
• Stanley Keyes' IMDB page