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January 03, 2006
Thoughts from Steve Griffith, MFA '77
I recently received an e-mail from Lance Brockman encouraging U of M alums to participate in the 75:20 events and to share memories. I'm not sure that I will be able to participate in the April events, but I do have many memories of the two years (1975-1977) I spent getting an M.F.A. in design at the University of Minnesota.
When I arrived in the fall of 1975, the move from Scott Hall had been made, and the systems needed to turn the cold, hulking, Rarig Center into Minnesota's largest (in the number of performance spaces) theatre complex, were being developed.
As I recall, we were doing a show in each theatre, each quarter and the production schedule was brutal! The effects of the last-minute budget cuts on the building were encountered at every turn. The shops were too small, backstage space tight or non-existent, and equipment scarce. Production staff was minimal and every grad student wanted to act, direct or design in every theatre, every quarter! Coming from a small, liberal arts college theatre program, I was a little unprepared for the rules, regulations, and forms, that were needed to keep a large university program running. Needless to say, there was quite a bit of tension as the faculty came to grips with the new building, the pending retirement and replacement of several senior faculty, the shape of the program, and know-it-all grad students, like me.
I didn't fully understand the pressures under which Jean and Lance were working until I graduated and began teaching and running a production program at a college, myself. How they could produce so much theatre, with so few resources still amazes me! Over time, adjustments in schedules, budgets, staffing and program directions have been made and the program has found its place and grown stronger.
The 1970s were amazing years in the United States. The ending of the Vietnam War, the energy crisis, Watergate, the explosion of arts including the regional theatre movement, were very real to students and faculty at the time. The distance between faculty and students was much more narrow than it is today and, I think, there was also less separation between personal and professional lives. This made work at the University and at other colleges and universities of the time very much focused on relationships.
Looking back, I especially value the way the faculty in the Theatre Department at the University of Minnesota took me seriously as a theatre artist, and provided both the discipline and encouragement that I needed as I began my own professional career. Special thanks must go to Lance Brockman, Jean Montgomery, and also to the late Wes Balk, for whom I designed the set for Happy End in the Stoll, my first "real" design.
Steve Griffith, M.F.A. '77
Chair, Department of Theatre and Dance
Gustavus Adolphus College
Posted by utheatre at January 3, 2006 10:26 AM | Alumni News