Warlord to Theatre Nerd

How a retired Marine ends up with a background in theatre arts.

Carrying the banner as Joe Pulitzer in Newsies the Musical.

One of the things I knew I had to wrestle with after retiring was figuring out my new identity within society. I would not be in a position of authority, I would not be in any recognizable pecking order, and I would no longer be in the profession of arms. I knew my outlook on who I was and how I approached my everyday life was going to change radically. Six months after I retired from the service, I decided use up some of those GI Bill benefits I'd always heard about. Little did I know how dramatic a change I it would be.

A quick primer on my background in the Marine Corps. I've been an infantryman, an embassy guard, a marksmanship instructor, 2^nd degree black belt instructor/trainer in the Marine Corps Martial Arts Program, and a combat tracker, among other things. I train in a traditional Japanese battlefield system with swords, spears, knives, naginata, etc. I'm the kind of person who enters a room noting where the exits are and who may be the most dangerous people present.

I say all this as a set-up of my identity before I suddenly became a theatre nerd my first semester back in college. I had no intention of getting involved in theatre at all. It was something I had done way back in the ancient days of high school, but not something I seriously thought about returning to. What I wanted to do was focus on creative writing. I had blogged for years under the moniker of America's Sergeant Major and wanted to learn more about the craft of writing, particularly the elements of story.

The university theatre department had auditions that fall for Arthur Miller's All My Sons. I decided not to audition for that under the pretense I really didn’t have the time to dedicate to it. It was my first semester back in school in a quarter century after all. Besides, I hadn't been involved in theatre in over thirty years.

In the military we live in a state of denial that anxiety is even a real thing. We do have a saying though, "If you're scared, just say you're scared."

I was scared.

Then I went to see the fall production. Dang, it was cool! There were young actors on stage who made me believe they were Kate Keller living in denial, or Joe Keller fooling himself that his crimes were justified. Dude, I could totally do that! What's more is I found myself wanting to do that.

Sometime after the production, I saw an audition announcement for something called Winter Shorts posted on a door outside the campus coffee shop. I asked a student lounging on a couch nearby if she knew what this Shorts thing was all about. She flew off the couch and bounded over to me explaining how I was SO going to do this because it was awesome.

Winter Shorts is the culminating event for the directing class. Each student directed a scene for their final grade. As it turned out, this young lady was one of the student directors. Her enthusiasm encouraged me to check it out.

The day of Winter Shorts auditions arrived. There had to be thirty people in the room and I recognized only one other student that I knew from class. Everyone else present were theatre department members or regularly in orbit of it. On the actor information sheet my age seemed like an awfully large number as I filled it in. Keep in mind I was thirty years older than almost everyone in the room save the department head.

Nervous? Me? America's Sergeant Major? I have stood boldly before hundreds of Marines at a time who dared me to make them learn. I have lead thousands of Marines on and off the battlefield. I'm the guy who lectured them on their behavior and comportment. Here I was reluctant to audition in front of bunch of kids who were mostly still teenagers. I stood back and watched as other aspirants read for the director of the first scene.

The next student-director happened to be the young lady who had encouraged me to be there in the first place. Her name was Callie, who I will forever count as a friend and someone on whose behalf I am willing to commit grievous acts of violence. I felt compelled to get off my tail feathers and read for her, so I sucked it up and jumped in.

To say that first reading knocked the thespian rust off my bones would be an understatement. I had so much fun I dove right in to every script they offered for the rest of the evening. I became an outraged father, a conman, a clueless boyfriend, and any number of Shakespearian rascals. It was a refreshing, invigorating experience that reignited the old performer in me (someone who never remained very far away if you ask my wife).

The next day I received an email from the head of the theatre department addressing me as ‘Sergeant-Major-turned-actor.’  She declared I had clearly missed my calling and quoted Olympic runner Eric Liddel, who said that God had made him fast and not to run was to hold Him in contempt. The implication being that I should continue to run where I was made fast.

I replied that I had never really considered myself an actor so much as a storyteller. Being an animated and dynamic speaker lent itself to effective communication, which I always considered an essential tool of leadership. It wasn't like I hadn't been running this whole time.

Her response was something along the lines of, "Storytelling is what we do in theatre dumb-dumb." She went on to point out that at the heart of a fine actor is a storyteller. In hindsight I have to admit my theatre experience eventually taught me more about the art and craft of storytelling than all of my writing classes combined.

The next thing I knew, I auditioned for the improv group and a Broadway musical for the spring production. I participated in campus life in a way I had not foreseen at all. The next semester, I declared a minor in theatre.

The themes we explored in the theatre department inspired a renewed focus on who I was, and a firm direction on who I wanted to become. It pointed me down avenues I had not considered, diverged on to less traveled paths and possibilities. My identity was not limited by labels and predetermined measurements, but by my own imagination and innovation. Like Aragorn, I became equally keen with a song or sword; like Gurney Halleck, peerless in battle or stringed baliset; like Porthos, a swashbuckling adventurer of gigantic mirth. I ran where I was fast and fully embraced my identity as a creative person. I became a bard of the old breed, a man of action and verse, a true warrior poet.

Mike,

Have no fear! Brooklyn’s here!