In the late ’80s, I had a newly earned BFA in musical theatre and was living in San Diego, California, looking for work as an actor. Des McAnuff, who was then the artistic director of the La Jolla Playhouse, cast me in a show he had penned himself – a musical called Silent Edward. The production was on a Theatre for Young Audiences contract, and that fortunate circumstance enabled me to join Actors’ Equity.
A TYA contract in 1988 meant waking up at 5 a.m. to meet the company van at 6:30 a.m. in order to arrive at an elementary school by 7:15 a.m. so that we could carry the set from the van to the school's cafeteria and, doubling as ASMs, assemble the playing area as the kids started lining up in the hall. That TYA contract was the first time I received a paycheck as a professional, and it was thrilling – $250 a week. (That’s before taxes.) I woke at 5 a.m. bounding toward my destiny.
I had finally jumped through the catch-22 window of joining the union that we all know and respect. After I moved to New York City a few years later, Des would cast me in my first Broadway show, The Who’s Tommy. But before we came to Broadway, Tommy was going to open out of town – at the La Jolla Playhouse. Welcome to the life of an actor!
Originally published in Equity News, Autumn 2016.
