The Start of Something New

This is the "before" picture. Like all "before" pictures...it isn't very flattering.

I am a fan of the theatre. An enthusiastic spectator. I used to be a practitioner, but I lacked the time and opportunity to do so on an amateur level and the drive to do so at the professional level. I am by all reports a good vocalist and actor though it has been 5 years since the last time I was on stage and that was the first time in 4 years. 

So save an isolated incident of theatre, it has been almost 10 years since I have graced a stage.

There was a time when there was nothing in my life more important than theatre. If there was a play I wanted to be in it. I worked in every avenue: performing, designing, directing, building, lighting…everything but costumes (you can ask my wife, I can barely dress myself let alone other people).

I spent two years in the theatre department at the University of South Dakota where my zeal for theatre grew, but my academics suffered. I interned at Youth Education on Stage in Williston, ND (my home theatre) for two summers. At 22-years-old I had played everything from Tony in West Side Story to Fagin in Oliver. One week it was Daddy Warbucks, the next I was insisting that dancing is not a crime to the town council in Footloose.

Eventually the academics caught up with me. Before I knew it I was in the US Navy which took me to Sicily, Florida and Afghanistan respectively. Needless to say life turned out a bit differently than I intended.

I don’t regret changing paths. What I do for a living is my calling. I am an ordained minister (Southern Baptist) and I work at a non-denominational Christian homeless mission in Rapid City, South Dakota. I work with fellow veterans who have fallen through the cracks of society and into homelessness. I love my job and I love spending every day engaged in face to face full time ministry.

I have a Bachelor of Science in Psychology, a Master of Arts in Theological Studies, and I am now in the beginning stages of doctoral work in Organizational Leadership with an emphasis in Christian Ministry.

I have a wife and 3 kids. All three of the rugrats are aged 5 and under. Every day is an adventure and every night seems to get interrupted five or six times. No matter what life throws at me, they are my priority.

 A few times a month I find opportunities to preach at area churches which I love to do.

So, I am a busy guy. Happy, but busy.

This busy life has kept me off the stage. However I do have a short list of plays and roles for which I would break my little finger to get a chance to perform. I accomplished one of these by playing Harold Hill in The Music Man while stationed in Sicily. (There is still a youtube video of part of that out there somewhere)

Fast forward to the other day when two things happened. First I had a random thought about how Les Miserables is my favorite all time musical and how great it would be to be able to perform it someday. Then I learned that this fall Black Hills Community Theatre will be staging their own production. My jaw is still in the dropped position.

I may not have time to even think about it. I don’t know. But if I do, believe me I will be auditioning my heart out.

It has, however come to my attention that I am on the whole about 75lbs heavier now than in my best theatre days (and about 40 of that I could really stand to lose). I am out of shape, getting winded if I have to take an extra flight of stairs, and just to put a little icing on the cake, I keep my hair buzzed down year round (not a very good look in the eyes of a director)

So there are some things that need to change between now and August when the auditions happen. 

Quite frankly (and please know there is humility behind this statement somewhere) there is no male role in Les Miz that I can’t pull off. ValJean would be a stretch vocally for me due to the range, but I could still make it happen. In any case I have decided that in order to be suitable for any role, I need to be up to Val Jean standards. Fit, vocal chords of steel, and bearded (We are talking Colm Wilkinson, not Hugh Jackman).

Val Jean is not the ideal role for me either, but if I can meet the standard, perhaps my audition will reap the results I want.

What I propose then is to spend my rare moments of free time over the summer journaling the process of preparing for my audition for Val Jean. I am going to grow my beard (which will be a feat all its own) and get myself on a strict exercise regimen. I might even post some pics and videos along the way. 

I also plan to share some thoughts on Les Miz and why I find it to be such a special piece of literature turned theatre.

This will mostly be of interest to myself and my family, but feel free to join me on this journey. The long and the short of it is this—even if I don’t make the audition, or get placed in the back of the barricade scene, I need to do these things (the healthy things) anyway. And this is my motivation.

By mid-August I need to be able to carry a young revolutionary around stage and still sing like an angel. Here goes nothing.