Evelyn Reidy

2025-26 Artistic Research Fellow

More Weight, or, I Saw Goody Proctor at the Gift Shop: A new play

The infamous court proceedings and subsequent executions of 1692-1623 in Salem, Massachusetts—colloquially known as the Salem Witch Trials—have long captured the public imagination in the United States and beyond. The oft sensationalized and frequently misunderstood events have inspired a significant canon of literary and dramatic works, not to mention a tourism industry that, for better or worse, buoys modern-day Salem’s economy. In a sea of books, plays, museums, scare attractions, kitschy waxworks, and “haunted Salem” tours, it is easy to lose sight of the stories of the twenty-five people who died—either by disease or execution—out of the over two hundred accused during a series of trials that tore a community apart and exposed many of the ugly prejudices that undergirded the American colonial project.

Set shortly after the location of the Witch Trials’ execution site was positively identified in 2016, More Weight… is a new play that tells the story of contemporary citizens in Salem who must navigate the practical and ethical challenges of making a living in a place famous for a heinous miscarriage of justice, all while the ghosts of the wrongfully executed women look on, perhaps pulling the strings of fate that dictate the lives of the twenty-first century inhabitants attempting to capitalize on their story.