Paul Stone
Music Director, CDE
Paul Stone, Music Director, Closed Door EntertainmentHow long have you been involved with CDE?
Involved since 2009, musical director since April 2010. I've had the pleasure of working both on stage and in the orchestra pit. As we prepare to put Les Misérables on stage in October, I look forward to stepping out of the pit and back on stage.
What you do as a music director?
Help cast the show, teach the songs to the cast, recruit and direct the orchestra. I have 30 years of choral directing experience.
Earliest theater memory?
Why did it stay with you? Attending a production of The Music Man at an amphitheater in Atlanta with my parents in the early 1960's. I remember sitting on the hillside, enthralled with the live action on the stage.
First theater-related activity?
I got involved in amateur theater 10 years ago. I played Pops Bailey in a production of 1940's Radio Hour at the Colonnade Theater in Catoosa county.
Musical favorites, least favorites and pet peeves?
Biggest pet peeve is singers who think our National Anthem is open to interpretation. One of my all-time favorites is the version Huey Lewis and the News sings. My least favorite goes back 45 years to the 1968 Democratic Convention in Chicago when Aretha Franklin not only put her soulful spin on the music, but also forgot the lyrics.
What do you do for fun and work when you aren't working in the theater?
I am retired from full-time employment. I'm the music director at Ringgold United Methodist Church and also work as an usher for the Chattanooga Lookouts. For fun I play golf and read.
What do you get from theater that you don't get from anything else you do?
Interacting with the audience of a show is a feeling like no other. There's no greater feeling than knowing you've brought them into the fantasy world of that show and, for a couple of hours, taken them away from the struggles and disarray of everyday life.
Brenda Schwab
Costume Designer, ETC
Brenda Schwab, Costume Designer, Ensemble Theatre of ChattanoogaWhat exactly does a costume designer do?
I collaborate with the director to carry out his vision of the production and I help define the characters through the costumes I put them in. The audience should have some idea of who and what a character is the minute they walk onstage, as well as have a sense of the time frame, season and locale. In addition to my work with ETC (since 2007), I'm the resident costume designer at Chattanooga State and part of the Professional Actor's Training Program staff, where I also teach costume design and construction.
How does someone become a costume designer?
It requires both a theatre background and an art background. Also great sewing skills! My grandmother and great-grandmother both were excellent quilters. When I was 5, my grandmother taught me to hand-sew. So began my design career making all my doll clothes.
Proudest achievement?
Being part of the production team that took That Other Woman's Child to the New York Musical Theatre Festival in 2008. I actually have costume reviews on Broadway Online-good ones!
Dream theatre job?
I think you have different dreams at different ages. When I was in my thirties, friends and I founded our own professional theatre company, The New Harmony Theatre, in New Harmony, Indiana. It is now the summer professional theatre under the auspices of the University of Southern Indiana at Evansville. Now that I'm older, I'm dying to do Follies.
All time favorite play or set?
The Rainmaker, a production out of Nashville that was a five-month tour to different locations. I played Lizzie. That set WAS the Curry home. I did the set dressing-lace curtains and tablecloth, doilies on the furniture. I'd pick fresh wildflowers from the vacant lot next door for the set. It was wondrous.
Personal challenge in my career?
Getting older. There are fewer roles for women my age.
John Thomas Cecil
Actor, ETC
John Thomas Cecil, actor, Ensemble Theatre of ChattanoogaEarliest theater memory:?
A grade school field trip to Memorial Auditorium. It was a stage production of short stories, including Edgar Allan Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart. I was hooked.
What you do at ETC?
I am a member of the executive staff, show producer and actor.
Proudest theater moment?
I was nominated for an Irene Ryan acting award in 2005, for performance as Oronte in The Misanthrope.
Most embarrassing theater moment?
While playing Demetrius during a college production of A Midsummer Night's Dream. I forgot my lines in the middle of the fight scene. We were all standing there onstage, panting from running around and fighting,
trying to figure out what came next.
Favorite all-time play?
Dinner with Friends. The writing is incredible and the way it addresses the societal norms related to conventional marriage is stunning.
Favorite actor/actress?
Meryl Streep.
When not at work in the theater, you...?
I'm a claims adjustor at US Xpress and the music minister at Our Lady of the Mount Catholic Church. Also, I am the owner of an online resale store called ShopCecil.com.
What you get from theater that you don't get from anything else in your life?
Playtime. Also the opportunity to be someone other than myself.
Advice to aspiring thespians?
Never give up.
Brittni Rhodes
Actress, Chattanooga Theatre Centre
Brittni Rhodes, Actress, Chattanooga Theatre CentreHow did you get started in theater?
I was cast in the ensemble of Oliver! (Humble Swan Productions) at the Tivoli Theater. As the show got near opening the Strawberry Seller started to miss her rehearsals, so I volunteered to sing her part in rehearsals. Later the director gave me the part.
Most embarrassing theater moment?
Two years ago I made my debut on the Mainstage in Hairspray playing Penny Pingleton. In the movie Penny sucks on a lollipop, but in the Broadway version she chews gum. One night the gum flew out of my mouth and onto the floor. I picked it up and placed it behind my ear but it wouldn't stick so I threw it off stage.
Proudest achievement?
At 14, I attended a two-week workshop in the Catskills with talent agent Peter Sklar. At the end of the workshop all the students got to perform off-Broadway at the Minetta Lane Theatre in New York City. My junior year in high school our school was picked by Disney to premiere the musical Tarzan. I got the part as Jane Porter. A picture of me as Jane made it into the director's handbook.
What is your dream theater job or role?
To perform on the big stage in New York City. My dream roles would be Bonnie Parker in Bonnie and Clyde: The Musical, Glinda in Wicked and Eponine in Les Misérables.
Favorite play?
Les Misérables and the revival of Pippin. My favorite actor is Johnny Depp. I admire how he develops his characters physically apart from himself as a person.
What do you do for fun and work when you aren't working in the theater?
Playing piano and working out. This fall, I will be attending Roosevelt University as a BFA musical theater major.
Scott Dunlap
Artistic Director, CTC
Scott Dunlap, Artistic Director, Chattanooga Theatre CentreGive us a run-down of your life in theater.
I started in the youth theatre as a designer. I have also been a production coordinator, costume and set designer, and artistic director. Beginning August 1, I'll be the youth theatre director.
Biggest challenge?
Time and deadlines. A theater friend posted a diagram of a diamond on Facebook. In the four points were Normal Eating Habits, Hygiene, Social Life and Sleep. In the middle it says "Pick Two."
What is your earliest theater memory and why did it stay with you?
Age 6 or 7, a production of The Snow Queen at the Alliance Theater. The grandson said if the Snow Queen tried to take him, he would put her on the stove and melt her. As he said "melt," the Snow Queen (a large puppet) began to crumple. That was the coolest thing I'd ever seen-the action commenting on the dialogue. Theater, I discovered, was a place where reality doesn't exist. I loved that.
Proudest achievement in your theater career?
Last year I wrote Mr. and Mrs. M: a Fantasia on Shakespeare's Macbeth. I combined 1930's costumes with vintage and techno music, and a soundscape created from Hitchcock films. The show won CTC's Miss Annie Award for Best Production of the Year.
What I love about theater is:
I love to see someone else get the same thing from a show that I do. Whether it's an audience member or an actor or someone painting a set, there's a camaraderie that is inexplicable. It's like being in love with someone. The more you try to explain love, the sillier it sounds. That's theater.
What's it like being a member of the CTC?
It's magical. There are professional actors who have worked in bigger markets, and those who have always wanted to do something onstage but have never been brave enough. There's something for everyone. It's just a matter of matching the actor or volunteer or patron with the right show and it becomes a dream factory.