The Young Director or The Dictator

There is something magical about being young in the theatre. I began my career as an actor. I was 19. I had dropped out of conservatory and was determined to have a career no matter what. The very first play I auditioned for was Alice in Wonderland at Artists Repertory Theatre. This is back when ART had a children's program, and was located in the YWCA, and before Allen Nause was the Artistic Director.  It was run by Rebecca Daniels and Melinda Pittman.  I was cast as the Fish Footman and The Seven of Hearts, mainly for my juggling skills.  My director was Pam Harr. I got paid $100. I was ecstatic. From that moment in 1986, I worked steadily as an actor and made my living at it for the next seven years, and I LOVED acting.

During that period of time I discovered a little company called The Miracle Theatre Group. In 1991 I was cast in a play there called Our Lady of the Tortilla. It was a fun little comedy. I really liked the director Jose Gonzalez even though he wasn't a very good director. He and his wife Danielle ran the company and they did everything. I would later go on to become their very first employee and work from the back of their house, but that is a different story. Jose and I got along really well and became friends. He was toying with the idea of making The Miracle a Hispanic theatre company, meaning they would do plays by Hispanic playwrights. I thought that was cool. I wasn't really sure what Hispanic meant at that time. I had never identified as Hispanic. But I liked my new friend and wanted to support him. At the same time I had been getting interested in directing. I had stage managed the long running Pump Boys and Dinette's and Sharon and Billy for ART and was fascinated by the process of directing.

I thought: When you are a director you are in charge. I wanted to be in charge of the outcome of a play. How hard could it be? You just tell everyone what to do and they do it and it comes out just the way you want it. Did I mention that one of the wonderful things about being young and in the theatre is that you are also dumb? I was dumb as they come, or maybe just really eager or both.


 So, I went to my friend Jose and asked him if I could direct a play. He asked if I had directed before and I said no, but that I knew I could do it. He said that they were going to do an original Christmas show. They were going to use members of the company (friends) to perform in the show. He was going to write it, it was A Christmas Carol meets It's a Wonderful Life meets the barrio life of a Mexican family. It was called Un Christmas Cuentos and it was the very first play I ever directed in my professional career.


Shortly after Halloween in 1991 we began rehearsals. Now I had been acting for five years at this point and had been a stage manager too. I knew how rehearsals were suppose to be run. It all just felt very different on the other side of the table. Did I mention that I had cast myself in the show too...well Jose wrote a part named Antonio...and I was an actor after all...I mean I can do both! My actors were a mixed bag of some experience and no experience. I would stop them and say..."I want you to move stage right on that line." or " Be angry on that line" or " Don't do it like that" or "I want you to talk faster there."  Quite often I would yell "NO!!!" "DO IT AGAIN!!!" "LEARN YOUR LINES!!!" I found that scaring them got them to listen to me. I was aggressive, I was bossy, I was a task master, I was a tyrant, I was a dictator. You know how babies cry and cry until you figure out that they are hungry or wet or tired...well that was me...I yelled and yelled because I did not have the words to communicate to my actors what it was I needed from them in order to serve the play. Luckily, this group of actors were very forgiving.

The world premiere of Un Christmas Cuento opened on December 5, 1991 at the Northwest Service Center presented by The Miracle Theatre Group and directed by yours truly. Rebecca Morris the critic at the Oregonian at the time was VERY KIND. The production was mediocre at best, and the direction was horrible. The story however was a good story and Jose had saved it with his writing. It was a holiday show that warmed people's heart with the right spirit of the season. I had really hoped that I would get reviewed as the next great American theatre director, but my dreams were crushed by my own inexperience and some gentle but honest words from an extremely kind critic who was fond of me as a person and did not want to batter my enthusiasm. 


I remember thinking that it could have been better. If I had better actors, a real set, real lights, if it had been in a better space. There were no production values, except for the sound which I had done...which was brilliant! Everything was everyone else's fault! That critic did not know what she was talking about! I will show them all...I WILL DIRECT AGAIN!!! Did I mention that I was dumb? Now being a dumb, eager, younger actor, wanna be director with a huge ego has some benefits. You just don't know shit, and you don't care that you don't know. I went from never directing, with the exception of some stuff in high school, to directing a cast of 10 in an hour long holiday show to my next venture. It was another play written by Jose. This time it was a full length, two act script with music, dance, folklore, and a cast of 24. I thought, no problem. I can do this. I just need to get the best actors I can!!!


In January of 1991 I held auditions for Cuentos by Jose Gonzalez...whose pen name is Martin Milagro. I had some really talented folks in that show, Bunnie Rivera, crazy Jim Cuevas,  Monica Rodriguez, Cam Sisco, and my gorgeous and talented wife at the time Rebecca Kimball. For the young directors out there reading this please note that if you are going to cast your wife, and you cast her in a role that she was not expecting, be prepared for the longest car ride home of your life. I will address relationships and directing in a future blog but just needed to get that out there for now. The rest of the cast was really wonderful too, and diverse, dancers, singers, actors who were 14 to 74 years of age. I was excited and nervous. This was a big undertaking. It was at this moment that I made my first real step in collaboration and thoughtful consideration without even knowing that I was doing it. I decided I needed help. I asked my good friend Linda Brown to stage manage for me, and got Tami Castillo Gray to choreograph. I had help. I did not have to do everything myself. I was not acting in the show either. I could focus on the actors. This was great!


I remember sitting at the table for the first read and I turned to Linda and said, "I am a little nervous, can you believe this? All these people think I know what the hell I am doing." She said "You should be nervous. And you better figure out what you are doing." Linda and I had been working together at Kaiser Permanente doing a touring show called Secrets which was about HIV/AIDS. We had performed in front of thousands of high school students. I trusted her immensely, she was also a singer, and choreographer and I would need her opinion on the work. I would like to note that Linda Brown was the very first person in my directing career that I asked for help, and her opinion. I would have never gotten through that show if it had not been for her. I don't think she ever forgave me for talking her into it, but we are still friends to this day.


The rehearsal process was grueling. We had actors missing rehearsal, actors unable to learn lines, playwright re-writes, dance rehearsals without dancers, lots of scheduling conflicts, and a director who had never directed 24 people before. My head was spinning each and every day, I felt like I was constantly treading water just barely able to catch my breath. I was again the shouter, the tyrant, the task master, the dictator. 

Side note: Back in high school I directed a show called Wednesday Night Live, which was our version of Saturday Night Live. It was filled with an hour and a half of sketch comedy that my friend Joel Kelly and I had written, and had musical guests, and was a huge success. During the rehearsal period of WNL I was ranting and raving and yelling at my friends who were all doing the show with me, and my friend Cherra yelled back at me.."who do you think you are the Royal Ton Wan?" Now this was back in the day of the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh who was the leader of a religious cult organization, and his followers called him the Royal Bhagwan. Cherra was telling me something...GET OFF YOUR HIGH HORSE...in so many words. The name Ton Wan stuck through high school by the way, and a couple of those friends still call me that to this day. 


But back to Cuentos: I realized that through all of my yelling, and dictator behavior I was becoming Ton Wan again, and that was something I wanted to get away from. I needed to get off the high horse. I did not have the tools, or maybe I did, but didn't know how to use them. I spent the latter half of the rehearsal process really listening, and observing, and remaining calm. I asked Linda her opinion a lot, and asked Tami Gray her opinion a lot. I asked Jose for his opinion. The next thing I knew, the play was taking shape. People were having fun. The story was being told. How did this happen? In the end, I was really proud of everyone involved. It was a good production. 

Cuentos opened on April 3, 1992. It was the second play I had directed, and the second world premiere. The critics were kind again. There were some really good performances in it. The story was very interesting and entertaining. The overall staging was okay, the direction was uneven. I was uneven, stuck between being an actor who had an understanding for the craft of acting, and a young (dumb) director whose desire was to try and translate what I knew about acting into directing. I did not have the words, understanding or skill.  I knew that the "dictator director" or "Ton Wan" would only go so far. I needed more experience, more knowledge, and guidance. I needed a mentor. 


It is worth mentioning that I did go on to act in five and direct thirteen more productions at The Miracle Theatre and have considered it one of my artistic homes for the last twenty-one years. 


Next Post: A Mentor and lessons provided by an actor and a designer. 


A Blog P.S.
I had some really great directors early in my career as an actor. I would like to acknowledge them.
Stan Foote (who gave me a living, and the best job I ever had, and several memorable Thanksgivings)
Beth Harper (who thought I was funny)
Pam Harr (who gave me my first and second job, taught me to schmooze, and has a bigger laugh than me)
Gary O'Brien (who hired me to do Shakespeare with no experience)
Pat Blem (who was the kindest spirit I ever met)


Thank you all.