To The Theatre

“To live a life useful.”

“To live a life useful” is the motto for Alpha Psi Omega, the National Dramatic Honorary Society. I am glad to be a member of this organization and have tried to live a life useful in the theatre. It hasn’t been easy. But that is what Alpha Psi Omega is about – the theatre; most specifically, college theatre. I remember during the initiation into this organization thinking about how I could be useful to the world of theatre. Most of my friends and fellow actors at the time went on to work in other areas – business, medicine, computer programming, etc… but not me. I had to be in the theatre. Don’t get me wrong, anyone can live a life that is useful; from a concrete mixer all the way to a college instructor. Usefulness is present in all walks of life, that much is obvious. My contribution to usefulness just happens to be in the theatre. I learned my values as a theatre artist at Thiel College.

Quite simply, my experience at Thiel College changed my life. I know it sounds so cliché, but it’s true. I discovered theatre, and the theatre was the first place where anything had made sense to me during my life to that point. At 18, that matters! By 26, that had become a goal. I went onto graduate studies in the theatre arts at Marquette University and set out to work at a small college where I could offer students the same opportunities and growth that Thiel had provided for me; a place where the arts would enhance the personal experience of young students, help them to grow, help them to find themselves perhaps. Not necessarily big time Broadway, but it made sense to me. I was lucky enough to have found such a gig at Penn State New Kensington, if only for a little while.

The strength of Thiel and PSNK and Pittsburgh Technical Institute (where I now work) and other similar schools is in working with students who are not performing arts majors. What they lack in talent or experience or trainable skill, they make up for in enthusiasm. With passion, dedication, hard work, they somehow do more even if they are studying something else entirely. And isn’t that what we want teaching to be about in its truest form? I would rather take 10 students who really care about the process and help them develop through rehearsals and onto a rewarding opening night than follow 5 mega stars who could do it without my guidance on Broadway. It’s just what I am made of.

I am indebted to Dr. Donald Bruckner and to the late Jackie Kallal for giving me my start at PSNK; and for all of the wonderful students and friends I met while working on that stage for 5 years, 10 shows, 31 live performances in front of a couple hundred people, roughly 300 rehearsal sessions and close to 1,000 hours of rehearsal. Wow! That is a lot….all for 62 hours of performance. Say it with me, guys and gals: “football players practice, actors rehearse.” It’s a mantra.

The beauty of working in the arts (and a lot of fields) is the time spent in preparing, the interaction with the students, the 13 hour days, the skipping of holidays and family time and yes, even Steelers games; the building of the set and sometimes rebuilding of the set – just to get a show up in time. The audience never sees that. They never see the whole cast and crew (and yes, even the director) on their knees cleaning the stage of confetti one night so that it can be tossed all over everywhere again the next night during the show; or the running of lines over and over again until they are actually memorized and finally sound logical; or the magic of hitting that note just right at the first audition and hitting it at every rehearsal and performance thereafter.

While we tend to love performing, I think most actors, and certainly most directors, enjoy the process more. It is the making of the art that challenges us – not the show. So while we go about trying to be useful, you are entertained. And we thank you for that opportunity. We truly do.

My experience in the theatre holds so many cherished memories that I cannot even begin to recount them. No matter the show, be it Shakespeare or a musical, it is a pursuit toward usefulness that drives us, motivates us, inspires us. And for me it was a joy. Working at PSNK theatre was an absolute joy. I learned a lot, hopefully taught a few things along the way and left as a better artist than I had entered.

For those who wish to pursue the theatre – do it! Keep acting, keep writing, keep dancing, keep directing, and in the end you will find your place. It may be New York, it may be Pittsburgh, it may be…anywhere. But you have to pursue it. Live your life useful!

People often ask me why I didn’t go to LA or New York. Well, I kind of knew that my hand would be better used elsewhere, that I could be useful in my own small way, in my own small town. And, honestly, I realized at an early stage of the process that I am a better director than I am an actor. More so, I believe in teaching the script first, believe in teaching the play more than directing it. It is a fine line.

Of everything I obtained from PSNK, a personal motto stays with me the most: “Without risks we are not artists, we are imitators.” That notion arose while we were working on Pippin in 2004, and I believe in those words. I really do. A student thought we should just do everything that was on the DVD from a 1970s touring production of the same show. I disagreed. Out of our argument came the notion that we just can’t copy what someone else has already done. We need to create! This was to be ours, if it was to be anything at all; we were artists – not imitators. I directed what I envisioned from the script as an artist not an imitator. For the record, we got three standing ovations, one for each night of that show.

About Thiel College. My mentor and professor, Dr. William A. Robinson (Dr. Bill to all Thiel Players), taught me everything I needed to know for a career in college theatre. He once interviewed for a job at PSNK – back in 1975 or 1976. He was hired at Thiel College first, and ironically that opened the door for Lil Coury to take her job at PSNK – a job she held until 2003 when she retired and opened the door for me to work there. Think about the sequence: Dr. Bill almost worked where I got my first job, but I was lucky enough to have studied under him at Thiel. He attended my first professional production at PSNK, which I only had the opportunity to do when Lil Coury retired. Life has a funny way of working out. Growing up in Pittsburgh, I didn’t even know the town of New Kensington existed. Now it is an integral part of who I am.

I thank everyone I met along the way for any small part you played in my success, and I wish you the best while you live your own life useful. I will wrap up in the same fashion I ended every rehearsal: “Questions? Comments? Concerns? Criticisms? None? Than that’s a night. See you next time…"