Split Britches
Lois Weaver and Peggy Shaw are co-founders of Split Britches . Since 1980, they have created an interconnected repertoire of performance and social engagement work, which is part of a larger, lifelong project to facilitate communication, wellness, and social change through performance. Recent projects include Ruff (2013), a performance exploring the experiences of having a stroke; Unexploded Ordnances (2018), a combination of performance and public conversation on subjects of anxiety, ageing, and unexplored potential; and Last Gasp (2020), a meditation on demise – demise of ageing bodies, civil conversations, and a sustainable planet. Over the 40 years, they also remain committed to collaborating with diverse communities. This manifests in the founding of WOW Café in NY; developing projects in domestic abuse safe houses in upstate NY and in LGBTQ+ communities in Minneapolis; collaborating with seniors on a performance about sex and ageing; working in women’s prisons in Brazil and the UK: developing performance with Taiwan Women’s Theatre Festival and creating therapeutic workshops for stroke survivors.
Split Britches’ collection of scripts, Split Britches Feminist Performance/Lesbian Practice, edited by Sue Ellen Case, won the 1997 Lambda Literary Award for Drama. In 2012, Split Britches was presented with the Edwin Booth Award by City University of New York in honor of their outstanding contribution to the New York City/American Theater and Performance Community. Both Lois Weaver and Peggy Shaw are Guggenheim Fellows and Peggy was the recipient of the Doris Duke and USA Artist Awards.
Lois and Peggy were named Senior Fellows by the Hemispheric Institute of Performance in 2014, an award given to scholars, artists and activists affiliated with the institute whose work illustrates the highest achievement in the field of performance and politics. The company received a 2017 NY Innovative Theatre Award, the 2022 Ellen Stewart Career Achievement in Professional Theatre Award and a NYC OBIE Lifetime Achievement Award in 2024.
Lois Weaver
Lois Weaver is an artist, activist and Professor of Contemporary Performance Practice at Queen Mary, University of London. She is a 2014 Guggenheim Fellow and a Wellcome Trust Engagement Fellow for 2016-2018. Lois was co-founder of Spiderwoman Theater, WOW Theatre in NYC and Artistic Director of Gay Sweatshop in London. She has been a writer, director and performer with Peggy Shaw and Split Britches since 1980. Recent performances include Unexploded Ordnances (2016-18); What Tammy Needs to Know About Getting Old and Having Sex (2015); and RUFF (2012). Her experiments in performance as a means of public engagement include Long Tables, Porch Sittings, Care Cafes and her facilitating persona, Tammy WhyNot. Lois’s performance practice and history has been documented and illustrated in The Only Way Home Is Through the Show: Performance Works of Lois Weaver, eds. Lois Weaver and Jen Harvie, published in 2015 by Intellect and the Live Art Development Agency. Lois was awarded the WOW Women in Creative Industries ‘Fighting the Good Fight’ award in 2018 and the 2019 Queen Mary Centre for Public Engagement Hawking Award for Developed Understanding of Public Engagement.
Peggy Shaw
Peggy Shaw is a performer, writer, producer and teacher of writing and performance. She co-founded Split Britches and WOW Café Theatre in NYC. She is a veteran of Hot Peaches and Spiderwoman. She is a 2019 Guggenheim Fellow, and a 2014 recipient of the Doris Duke Artist and 2016 USA Arts Award. In 2017, Peggy was awarded an honorary doctorate from Queen Mary University of London for her contribution to theatre and the institution. Peggy has received three NYFA Fellowships and three OBIE Awards. She was the recipient of the 1995 Anderson Foundation Stonewall Award and Foundation for Contemporary Arts Theatre Performer of the Year Award in 2005. Her book A Menopausal Gentleman, edited by Jill Dolan and published by Michigan Press, won the 2012 Lambda Literary Award for LBGT Drama. Peggy was the 2011 recipient of the Ethyl Eichelberger Award for the creation of RUFF, a musical collaboration that explores her experiences of having a stroke.
