(traffic whooshing) (mellow music) - The show is the culmination of the effort of, you know, maybe a hundred people at any one given time.

What's magic about community theater is it's never guaranteed that any one of those people knew that they could do that thing before they got here.

(performers clapping and stomping) On the whole, not only this theater, but I think community theaters in general, had lost their focus on the people behind the scenes, where the actors and the director, and the show must go on, and me saying, "Well, wait a minute, "before we even get to the show, we've got a hundred needs.

"We've got a hundred different people "that we need to find to get to this point."

- Our board is totally volunteer.

Anybody who works on a show here, all volunteer.

Being the volunteer coordinator is kind of a really important role because the goal is to make sure our volunteers feel heard, they feel appreciated, they know their value.

We literally could not do any of what we do without our volunteers - [Actor] Taught by a famous historian.

- You got one more, Bobby.

- Phil, Phil, can I, can I call you- - Students!

Students.

- Students, um.

(audience laughing) - One thing we also embrace here is, and I've said it over and over again to my board, is everybody who shows up here is our volunteer.

We don't ever say, "That person wants to stage-manage, "but they don't have any experience, "so they can't stage-manage.

"That person is not a painter, so they can't paint for us."

This show is directed by a brand new director; never directed before.

And we didn't say no to that.

- And then Jakar, this is going to stop center.

So if you guys (indistinct).

- [Sean] We focus on what are the resources.

We said "Now we have a volunteer that wants "to fill one of our positions.

"How do we give them the resources "and the support they need to make it happen?"

- Theater is such a unique art form.

It's so different from a movie, or reading a book, or something because it really is experiential.

Every time someone comes in and experiences volunteering here for the first time, even if it's a little scary for them to jump in because they're interested in lighting, but they've never done lighting before, or whatever it is, we have so many people that are here to guide them.

- I worked in drama class stuff in school, but when I went active duty, I stopped doing anything in theaters.

Just didn't have time.

And one of the things that you do as an engineer, you do a lot of training for fire drills.

So you use the smoke machines, all that.

Well, when I first got back into theater, the first thing I did was I was working backstage on a production called "The Witches," which you've probably seen the movie, right?

And they were using smoke machines for all these transitions, and they asked me, "Hey, do you know anything about these smoke machines?"

Yeah, I do.

So I helped reset the smoke machines so the effects would worked properly, and one thing led to another.

I started helping backstage, I started helping build sets.

Next thing I know I was auditioning for a little part here, a little part there, and it just kinda steamrolled.

- Yeahhh!

- I build sets, and I'm acting 'em, and I'm having fun.

Yeah.

- It's really cool to see people grow and push themselves a little bit, get out of their comfort zones.

and just try different types of art because there's so many different types of art you can try in the theater.

(performers stomping) - [All] True!

(audience applauding and cheering) (gentle music) - It's such a great way to tap into a creative outlet that maybe you don't know that you have.

Like I said, this was my first time ever working in theater, really, and I found that I like to be very creative, but here it's pulled out some different things.

Even within me.

I've directed now two shows, helping just organize and do different things, come up with lots of different ideas for shows, and season extras, and different things.

I think when you get to be around a group of creative people, it pulls out things in you that maybe you didn't realize were there.

- Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey just let me think about it!

- I'm gonna get one person down there, one person in the middle, and then I'm gonna grab here and we're gonna feed it up here.

- First time being an artistic director.

Here it's easier in the sense that I have more of a support team.

We have a mix of people who have experience in the arts and in theater, but then we get a lot of people that just come in and they just wanna help, and they just think it would be cool, and they show up.

They all came in, and they had a good time, and they're keeping in touch with each other, and building communities of their own within our community.

- I find this great history.

Rose Wilson started this in her living room in 1925 as a one-act play reading group.

And I've been happy to be part of it.

What brings me back?

Someday, my name will go on a little two and a half inch by one inch plaque in the green room that Sean Thompson was president here for a very brief moment of this glorious history.

And I like that.

I think that's a cool thing.

(audience cheering and applauding) (audience continues applauding) (audience continues applauding) (music fades out)