The Off Center, a Staunton performing arts organization specializing in experimental puppetry and theatre, is producing Degenerate: The DeJarnette Project, a new, original play that explores the legacy of eugenics in Staunton, which was instigated by Dr. Joseph DeJarnette at the Western State Hospital in the first half of the twentieth century.
Written by Diana Black and Off Center founder Davey White, the play partly clown cabaret, a style of theater featuring grotesque puppets and masks, and partly the story of Evelyn Abbott, a fictional woman whose story bears resemblance to many who were sterilized and/or lobotomized without consent.

Degenerate examines the way that a proud and welcoming community deals with the most shameful parts of their legacy. “Engaging with this history is difficult and challenging, but we are doing it because we love this community and we want to learn from its past,” says White.

Degenerate features performances by Claire Josefson, Maria Leckey, Jean Roche, Nat Slater, and Maria Strickler, and Cutch Tuttle. It features original music by Leckey and Tuttle, and puppets by Josefson, Slater, and White. Davey White is directing this piece and Diana Black provided dramaturgical research.

“Eugenics was considered a progressive and helpful ideology during the 1920s and had very few opponents,” states Black. “It was bigotry disguised and legitimized by the language and trappings of ‘rational’ science. And Virginia was very much at the center of this movement in terms of creating policies.”

Strickler adds: “Even though I was somewhat familiar with DeJarnette’s mission, a shrouded mystery still remained around him and his “hospital”, and there are moments in our show that still bring me such pause. This particular story is so tied to our area, and to the times we find ourselves in.”