On Monday, 11/24/14, I will start writing about my experience with the Theatre Department at Eastern New Mexico University. I will start like I did with the Radio/TV Department and work my way through each of the four years that I was there. However, since the professors played a large role in the department, I need to tell you about the three main ones since I will be making frequent reference to them. In Radio/TV, I just basically had classes with the professors and almost never saw them outside school hours. But in Theatre, I had to rehearse and work with these professors on a constant basis when I was involved in a production. I also frequently went to their homes.
The head of the department was Dr. R. (Actually, he didn't get his doctorate until the end of my freshman year, but I'm going to just call him Dr. R all four years to avoid confusion.) Dr. R was around 42 years old when I came to ENMU. He grew up in Texas and had an extensive background in Theatre before he started teaching at ENMU.
I first met him during my junior year in high school. He had come down to participate in our Career Day with other people from the Music Department. As I was in Student Council at the time, I had been selected to introduce him and the others in the seminar they were taking part in.
Dr. R was a very heavy-handed director who was known for his passion for perfection and his sharp witticisms. If he didn't feel like he was getting what he wanted out of an actor, he would go up on stage and slap him. Everybody on stage would freak out when this happened and they all upped their game in the next runthrough of the scene.
Dr. R appealed to the intellectual and artistic sides of the students. Everybody worked to gain his approval. He was very much the father figure of the department.
As such, Dr. W was the mother figure. His approach to directing was quite different from Dr. R. He was rather nurturing toward the students and worked to build a strong rapport among the cast, going so far as to make everyone chili for lunch after a Saturday rehearsal. While Dr. R thrived on chaos behind the scenes, Dr. W would act quickly to stop things from getting out of hand.
Dr. W was born and raised in Utah. He was 50 years old when I started college. I first met him during my sophomore year in high school when I attended a make up workshop during the ENMU Drama Festival. I approached him to be the volunteer for putting on a beard and got one. Dr. W did remember me from that.
Dr. W taught the Theatre History classes. He was very knowledgable on how Theatre was performed in past civilizations and made those classes enjoyable.
The funny thing is that as much as I liked Dr. W as a professor, I recently realized that he never actually cast me in any of the mainstage productions he directed during the school year. While I played a priest in "The King and I" my sophomore year, I was not part of the initial cast. He posted that he needed people to play priests and to come see him if we were interested. I wanted to do something in the show, so I volunteered. The only other times he cast me was in the 1985 summer session production of "Carnival" and in a "black box" production of "Entertaining Mr. Sloane."
The third constant on the Theatre staff was Mr. H. He was new to the department my freshman year as our technical director. Mr. H had some big shoes to fill as his predecessor was absolutely LOVED by the students. His predecessor spent lots of time working on the sets for the productions. However, Mr. H had a family, so he tended to rush through getting everything set up as soon as possible so he didn't have to spend any more time on the projects. They still came out good, but all the upperclassmen continually griped about him. Mr. H really only got along with two of us, Chud and myself.
Dr. R currently lives in Las Vegas, NM. Dr. W passed away two years ago at the age of 80 and Mr. H left ENMU after I completed my senior year. Chud still keeps in contact with him.
There were other people on the staff. For example, Mr. H's wife worked in the Costume Department. We had a couple of different Dance instructors, and Ms. C and Ms. F were graduate students who taught a few acting classes. While I will be making a few references to these, I will mostly write about the top three people in the department.
Like I said, the fun begins on 11/24/14. I am going to take a week off as I have some personal stuff going on and don't have as much time to devote to the blog. I hope to hammer out at least a week's worth of articles. I've noticed this has been a pattern lately, in which I post every day for two solid months and then take a little time off. I always need that time off to focus my thoughts, otherwise everythng comes out rather forced and what is supposed to be a light-hearted look at my life will suddenly turn into despair.
I don't want anyone to worry about me.
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