Title:
Director of Education
Birthday:
June 21
Hometown:
Shrewsbury, Massachusettes
College Attended:
Northwestern University
Favorite Beatles Song or 19th Century President:
Blackbird
Email:
carolyn@thehousetheatre.com
I was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, bred in Worcester, Massachusetts and currently reside in the glory that is Chicago. I graduated Northwestern University with a BA in Drama (not theatre). I majored in this tiny program that is part of the college’s English Department so that I could cut corners and avoid the bs that comes with getting a BS in Theatre. I studied in London at BADA for a year in order to get that intense theatre experience—fortuitous, as Nate Allen shared my company.
The best piece of advice I received before leaving the realm of academia was to find a person or a group of people I believed in. Once found, I was encouraged to stick with them, and learn. I thought I might pick up and leave the country, lay myself out on Simon McBurney or Pina Bausch’s doorstep.
Instead I had oysters at Raw Bar with Nate in March of 2001 and took home a napkin with a mission statement on it to make a House.
I am proud to be a founding member of The House mostly because it makes me feel like I have a home. My growth as an artist in the last five years has come largely from the clashing and culminating of ideas among the growing number of artists in the company. I feel extremely lucky to believe in something so tangible, especially in a field that does not often offer such ground. I feel lucky to be so aware of when a community is being formed in a live space, and when its potential is being ignored. I feel lucky to be challenged as a director of an education department in the making: realizing how well it correlates to The House’s artistic goals of building community by breaking down imaginary walls between performers and audiences. I feel lucky to perform regularly in powerful, female roles. I feel lucky to be terrified by every project I have ever taken on—in or outside of The House. I feel lucky to be actively working on becoming a better actor, dancer, singer, fighter, writer, teacher, director, leader.
Currently I am most compelled by schools that are well run, where teachers tell students what to do instead of what not to do. I am compelled by hot air balloons and volcanoes. I am inspired by my fellow peers, and though I long for heroes in the political stratosphere, I deem the creation of epic stories in grungy/hip warehouses to be a hopeful surrogate.
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