Somebody quoted a saying to me once: “Leap, and the net will appear.” Think
it’s an old Buddhist maxim, but I could be wrong. In any case, I figured I’d
get the ball rolling on my contribution to this site and get myself familiar
with the readers. So anyway, I’m Ross Brooks, and I’m stoked to be writing
for Tee’s blog. Tee and I have known each other for years-schoolchums, as it
were, and it’s good to be working with him again.

So, you’ve got my bio, which tells you the basics, but I suppose I could
elaborate more on who I am and what I’m about. I’m a Nashville native, born
and raised in Music City. I’ve lived on both coasts long enough to know that
neither one was for me, so I decided to move back to Nashville after grad
school and a stint in LA, and I’ve been happier and working much more
steadily ever since. All in all, Nashville has got a wonderfully vibrant,
albeit small, theatre scene, with only a few Equity houses. The recession
and subsequent cuts in arts funding have taken their toll on budgets round
here, but this is the town of the little theatre company that could, lemme
tell ya. A quick rundown of (and free publicity for) the major companies in
Nashville:

Nashville Children’s Theatre - the country’s oldest children’s theatre,
started by the Junior League of Nashville in the 30s, and recently rated by
Time Magazine as one of the top 5 children’s theatres in the country. Scot
Copeland, the Producing Director, is internationally recognized as one of
the driving forces in TYA (Theatre for Young Audiences, to use the correct
nomenclature), and he’s a brilliantly gifted director as well as being a
talented playwright and performer. Plus, he’s one hell of a guy, and a good
friend and mentor to me. Hands down, this is the best theatre you’re going
to see in Nashville, no matter how old your driver’s license says you are.
The shows are top notch from every angle. While NCT has no true resident
company, it has a stable of regular actors which it considers its “company”,
and I’m proud to say I’ve been a member for a few years now. It’s a
wonderful place to work - you’re there with family.

Tennessee Repertory Theatre - The largest regional theatre in Tennessee, the
Rep has been going strong for a good twenty or so years now, and altho it
has had its ups and downs, it still produces good work. The Rep changed
hands a couple of years ago and is now run by the team of David Alford and
Rene Copeland, founders of the smaller local company Mockingbird Theatre,
which closed its doors earlier this year at the behest of Alford. The
mission of Mockingbird pretty much moved over to the Rep with David and
Rene, so the quality of the work is high and consistent.

Nashville Shakespeare Festival - Damn near every major city has one of
these, and it’s a good thing, too. NSF has been around for nearly twenty
years, and it has been producing free Shakespeare in the Park every summer
for about ten of those now. Helmed by Denice Hicks, NSF works to keep the
Bard’s words alive.

People’s Branch Theatre - started in 2000 by local actor Brian Niece, PBT
publicizes itself as Nashville’s leading experimental theatre, producing
original works as well as imaginative takes on classics and literary
adaptations. PBT also changed hands roughly three years ago, and is now run
by Matt Chiorini, who has revitalized what was a struggling SPT company.

That’s really it for the professional companies in town. There are a number
of semipro and amatuer companies around that put out good work, the flagship
of these being Actor’s Bridge Ensemble, a semipro company founded and led by
Bill Feehely, a New Jersey transplant. They’ve been around for about ten
years now, give or take, and they do consistently high-quality,
groundbreaking work. They ain’t afraid to take a chance or two.

In 2003, Nashville became a Equity Liaison city, meaning that there are at
least one hundred active members of AEA living and working here. While all
of the major companies in town are committed to using local talent as
opposed to bringing in actors from NY-LA-Chicago, the Children’s Theatre is
the only full Equity company in town. By this I mean that, regardless of
whether you are a member of the union or not, you get the same contract
offered to you and the same pay. NCT also pays money into the Equity Pension
and Health Fund for you regardless of whether or not you are a member. Since
Tennessee is a Right-To-Work state, labor laws prohibit closed shops, so
theatres are free to hire both Equity and non-Equity actors. However, any
theatre with an Equity contract must hire a certain number of union members
per show. The rest of the companies are either on SPT (Small Professional
Theatre) or LOA (Letter Of Agreement) contracts with Equity, allowing them
to offer different contracts to non-Equity talent. This means they don’t pay
into the Health and Pension Fund, and if you aren’t union, you aren’t
eligible for any benefits from them.

The state of the Union is a huge concern in the professional world right
now. Contract negotiations and strikes have been well-publicized lately, and
the acting community is finding itself with a rough road ahead. In
Nashville, this problem is especially relevant. Due to the large pool of
talent and the small number of contracts available, it is becoming harder
and harder for even the best actors in town to get enough work weeks to get
a year’s worth of insurance. If you arent’ familiar with how this system
works, here’s a quick rundown: In order to qualify for health insurance thru
Equity, an actor must work twenty weeks in a year. This is not necessarily a
calendar year - it really depends on when you joined. The union does a
lookback every six months and tabulates the number of weeks you are recorded
to have worked, and after twelve months, they tell you whether or not you
qualify for a year’s worth of health insurance. Once you’ve got that first
year, you still have to get twenty weeks in the next year to keep it going
with no lapses. When I joined in 2002, things were in such good shape in the
economy that you only had to work twelve weeks to get a year’s worth, but
soon after I joined the number went up, thanks to spiraling health care
costs and the unprecedented depletion of the Equity fund. Good or bad,
Equity quickly raised the number back to twenty weeks, where it had been
about seven or eight years before, and now it’s harder than ever to get your
insurance. I’m one of the lucky few who has managed to keep myself insured
consecutively ever since i joined, but the next year looks to be tough for
me, too. Some of it is luck of the draw - you don’t always get cast like you
think you will, and some of it is just lack of work. In any case,
Equity-wise, Nashville is in a precarious place at the moment, and the local
acting community is rallying itself together to try and make some changes.
One of the great things about Nashville for actors is that it’s a very
friendly town. It’s big enough that it has plenty to do, and the art scene
is strong, if small. It’s a great place to raise a family, so if you’re an
actor who wants to have kids someday, this ain’t a bad place to be. However,
there are plenty of challenges to face that could make things less
hospitable round here for theatre, so we’ve got plenty of work to do to keep
ourselves working. But I have to tell you, I love my hometown, and I think
it has the potential to be a major theatrical center. The talent is here,
and so is the money to fund it, we just have to find new ways to draw the
audience.

Whew. I hadn’t intended to ramble quite so much, but I got on a roll. I
think I said more about Nashville than about myself, but that’s okay. This
is my first foray into the blogging world, so give me a little leeway. In
the coming days and months I hope I manage to impart some interesting
information and provoke some exchange of ideas. I’m facing some new
challenges in my career at the moment - i’m moving into teaching, which is
kind of new territory for me. I’m teaching an acting class at a local
community college as well as directing a show there, so I’ll most likely be
sharing my thoughts and experiences with that as time goes by. Plus, i’m
trying to keep my writing career going strong as well, so anytime I have
something I need to rant about, this is probably where you’ll find it. But
my fingers are getting sore, so I’m gonna stop now.

Ross

This entry was posted on Friday, January 20th, 2006 at 6:32 am and is filed under Acting Journal, Journal. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.