Insights and Inspiration

There was a time—not that long ago, though it feels like another lifetime—when Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip was the industry punchline.  Too expensive, too self-important, too preachy and too stacked with high-paid actors delivering monologues like they were...

There are shows you direct that go well, and there are shows you’re immensely proud of.  I’ve been privileged to have both.  But every once in a while there’s the one where everyone in the room quietly realizes, oh… this is different. That was Rabbit Hole at...

If you stay in community theatre long enough, you’ll eventually sit through an adjudication. Usually with a notebook in your lap, a knot in your stomach, and somebody (likely me) whispering, “Well… here we go.” I have mixed feelings about adjudication, and I suspect I...

There’s a point in rehearsals — usually a few weeks in — where something quietly goes off the rails, and it doesn’t look like a problem at first. Everything is… working.  The blocking is set. People know where they’re going. Lines are mostly there. The scenes are...

That first read-through.  The thing I secretly love more than opening night. You all know the scene. A semi-circle of mismatched chairs. Someone’s already spilled coffee on their script. Half the cast is meeting for the first time, the other half is pretending...

Every theatre company has its own bucket list.  The big musicals and the crowd pleasers. Elaborate shows with giant sets, flying rigs, and the orchestra that somehow has to fit into a pit the size of a bathtub. That’s all well and good, of course.  But every...

There’s a long-standing myth in theatre that great work comes from tension. From clashing personalities. From directors pushing actors into emotional corners until the sparks start flying. That makes for a good behind-the-scenes documentary, but in community theatre,...

One of the things I find myself saying a lot in rehearsal is this: “Don’t rush the silence.” An actor will land a line beautifully. The intention is clear, the moment works… and then they immediately charge into the next line and I have to stop them. Because the...

I’m in the middle of directing Rabbit Hole by David Lindsay-Abaire at WCT right now, and I’ve made a decision that might sound counter-intuitive: we’re actually cutting back on some of the rehearsal time we were given. It’s not because we’re behind because we...

If there’s one thing every community theatre director knows, it’s this: notes are part of the process. But how we give them — when, where, and in what form — matters almost as much as what the notes actually are. A recent article on OnStage Blog by Chris Peterson...