You may have seen Don Matthews as Lancelot in “Camelot” or as Don Quixote in “Man of La Mancha” at the Camelot Theatre. You may have heard him on the radio; he’s the Classical Music Director at JPR. Don sings with the Siskiyou Singers, the Reparatory Singers, and the Rogue Opera. He teaches in the Music Department Southern Oregon University. Over opulent omelets at the Morning Glory café in Ashland, Don and I talked about how performing can be both terrifying and liberating.
DM: There’s nothing more personal than singing or acting. You are your instrument, you’re up there. There’s no place to go. You can’t hide. As a singer, when you’re standing there singing a recital or a concert, it’s just you. You’re a little more exposed because you don’t have a character to play. When you’re playing a character, you can let yourself be in that character. It’s still you, but you don’t actually own it in the same way. You get to be somebody else. You can be all these things that you can’t be offstage. It goes back to your ability to allow yourself to feel and experience things which would just not be acceptable in our society.
“Hidden Agendas”, Oregon Stage Works Playwrights Unit’s next production, features “The Other Side” by veteran playwright Bob Valine. Bob met with early success, collecting numerous awards and fellowships. His play “Black Judas” was produced at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles before he followed the “spiritual path”. Now, winding down a long career in teaching, Bob is seeing his plays produced again. Outside on a sunny day, we chatted about his evolution as a playwright.
BV: It’s become a passion, now. It’s something I really need to do. My early playwriting was instinctive, a lot of anger and revolution. Now it’s different. It’s exploring who we are and what we’re doing here, and exploring human emotions, my own and others.
“Lately I’ve been very busy,” said Dennis Nicomede who recently delivered stunning performances playing numerous characters in “Love’s Not Time’s Fool” at Rogue Community College. Dennis has just written the narration for “Spotlight on the Mills Brothers” at the Camelot Theatre, and is soon to portray John Smith in “Breaking the Code” at the Ashland Contemporary Theatre. I visited Dennis and his wife, Jeanne, in their charming home in Talent.
EH: Tell me about “Breaking the Code.”
DN: It’s about Alan Turing, the mathematician that broke the German enigma code. That’s a play I’d refer to as a drama, something that has some real emotional value to it.
If you were lucky enough to see Oregon Stage Works’ Playwrights Unit’s last series of plays, “Seven Deadly Sins”, you saw seasoned Broadway actress, Gloria Rossi-Menedez, give delightful performances in six of them.
Gloria’s new restaurant, Blue – Greek on Granite, has been an overwhelming success. It’s a family enterprise, which she shares with her husband, George, daughter, Thea, soon to be joined by son, Alexi. As we dined on the outdoor patio of Blue, Gloria and I talked about the “Greek mystique”.
When Gloria and I were in our teens, we spent six months studying at the University of California’s Classical Theater campuses in Athens and Delphi, Greece. During our stay, the country was suddenly locked in a military coup, and we learned valuable lessons about politics and the power of theater.
“Love’s Not Time’s Fool” features Jennifer Phillips acting and singing in many of the forty-eight Shakespeare sonnets in music, song, and drama, opening Friday May 14, at Rogue Community College in Medford, directed by Ron Danko and produced by Jon Cole.
After studying at the American Musical and Dramatic Academy in New York, Jennifer came to RCC and performed as Countess Aurelia in the “Madwoman of Chaillot”. Last year she played a delightful Portia in RCC’s “Merchant of Venice”. Jennifer plans study drama at Portland State University next fall. We visited in the drama office of RCC’s “Off the Crate” Warehouse where the production was busily being mounted.
EH: Do you think theater is effective communication?
JP: If people are open-minded, there’s a message pretty much behind everything that’s done. Ron Danko and Jon Cole always have some point that they’re especially trying to get across.
EH: What was their point with the “Merchant of Venice”?
JP: It was a wake-up call to people. “Merchant of Venice” had a lot do with racial tensions in the world and hypocrisy and the way that people present themselves and don’t live up to their own values and morals. Everybody’s got good, and everybody’s got bad. You can’t just stand there and judge people.
EH: Of all the plays that you have done here, what was your best experience?
JP: “Madwoman of Chaillot”; the camaraderie within the cast was beyond compare. There was love among the cast, and the message was love. It was a beautiful experience.
EH: What is it about theater that is so exciting?
JP: There’s a truth of spirit in theater. We live in a world where we walk around with walls up all of the time. We’re afraid of what people will think of us, we’re afraid to be ourselves. We’re afraid to express any aspect of our being, really. We just keep ourselves closed off at all time. It’s a self-defense mechanism, and necessary in the brutal world that we live in. But you get into a theater, and it’s a space of trust. It’s a space where you can let those walls down and express your true being. You can be true to emotions without the repercussions of judgment. It’s a safe place. It’s a haven.
EH: Some people think that acting is dangerous.
JP: You’re vulnerable, it’s true. But if you don’t risk anything, you never grow. If you let yourself go with whatever emotion you need to be feeling or with the purpose you’re trying to express, then the potential is limitless: to the audience, what they can get from it, and to yourself, how you can grow from the experience.
EH: Why did you change your Major from Math to Drama?
JP: I grew up believing that you should follow your dreams. I’m not a materialistic person, but I need to be able to survive. Even if I work at a coffee shop the rest of my life, I still could do what I love. That’s the real happiness in life; so drama has become my intended major.
EH: How does theater affect your family?
JP: I come from a family that is very supportive. I’m a much happier person when I’m involved in something. They see the change in me. It brings such light to my being. They’re my biggest fans.
“LOVE’S NOT TIME’S FOOL” plays Friday – Sunday, May 14 – 16 & 21 – 23, Friday & Saturday at 8 p.m., Sunday at 2 p.m. & 7 p.m. $10 for Adults, $5 for students. For tickets and information call 245-7637.
David Rowley, former ad-man and eternal Beatle-maniac, is making his acting debut in “LOVE’S NOT TIME’S FOOL”, Ron Danko’s adaptation of the sonnets of William Shakespeare, opening Friday, May 14, at Rogue Community College in Medford. I met David, who sports a slight Yorkshire accent, in the lobby of the Higher Education Center on the Riverside Campus for “a few giggles”. We were joined by director, Ron Danko.
EH: How is it that you’re here acting?
DR: I’ve always been interested in acting, but I owned an advertising agency, and my working life took so much of my energy and time. It’s just that I throw myself into whatever I do, and give it my all. I just knew that there was nothing left. Having been involved in this production for the last month, I see how much time and energy it takes, I was right-on about that. I’m really enjoying it a lot. And it’s a big-time challenge for me. It’s a challenge to learn the lines. But the fun begins once the lines are learned.
From an after-school activity stemming out of her ESL classroom in South Medford High School, Victoria Snow Mountain developed an enduring and successful multicultural performance group. I met Snow at El Tapatio Restaurant here in Ashland. As we enjoyed a scrumptious breakfast with her three delightful granddaughters, Snow described the evolution of her remarkable dance troupe, Ballet Folklórico.
EH: How does participating in Ballet Folklórico affect the character of its performers?
VSM: We’ve always seen that performing makes people feel poised and proud of themselves and have more self-assurance. Our vision is a community where the kids are poised and confident. Our mission is to empower kids to dance, and to feel comfortable with their cultural heritage, whatever their cultural heritage may be. We are preserving some of the cultural traditions of Mexico in particular, in the costumes and performances that we do. The majority of our dancers are Latino kids, yet our group is open to all people. Many of our dancers aren’t Latino. We are preserving and transmitting the traditional cultural values of respect, responsibility, and collaboration that are found not only in the Latino culture. Most cultures have that same basis, so it’s for everybody.
You may have seen Don Matthews as Lancelot in “Camelot” or as Don Quixote in “Man of La Mancha” at the Camelot Theatre. You may have heard him on the radio; he’s the Classical Music Director at JPR. Don sings with the Siskiyou Singers, the Reparatory Singers, and the Rogue Opera. He teaches in the Music Department Southern Oregon University. Over opulent omelets at the Morning Glory café in Ashland, Don and I talked about how performing can be both terrifying and liberating.
Ashland Theatre 