MEETING AND PERFORMANCE -LPWNC

Lost Playwrights of WNC Poster

September 26th, at Dock’s Deli

Meeting at 4pm and show at 7pm. Usual $5 donation.

Stan Logan Interview

Adventure House and the Adventure House Players

Stan Logan, playwright, director, and actor recently shared his adventures with the new Adventure House Players with the Lost Playwrights Society of Western, North Carolina. Adventure House is a Clubhouse and Mental Health Facility for the both the recovering and the functionally mentally ill of Shelby, Cleveland County, NC and it has recently begun offering a very successful course in “Drama Therapy”.

At the head of the program, Mr. Stan Logan, who was kind enough to offer me the interview below. After the interview please read the information on Adventure House itself and what a wonderful service it provides to the greater Shelby area.

So let’s start at the top, what’s your name?

A: Stan Logan And how you got involved in drama to begin with, Stan? A: I got involved in drama as a young child being cast in the youngest role in the Sound of Music in the community theatre in Sumter, South Carolina. I went there only to support a friend at the time. I got cast, she didn’t. After two weeks rehearsal, I dropped out because I was scared to death and I didn’t return to the stage until after college. Always wanted to act, but didn’t get the courage to return to theatre school until I was accepted at the University of California / Santa Barbara in their acting program. It was there that I stumbled into directing and found that that was my area of expertise, not acting, and the rest is history.

And what do you gain from the dramatic process?

A: I have a creative outlet that has to be expressed or I would go crazy. I also write music and lyrics for songs. I draw and paint, but its mainly directing with a little acting that drives that creative energy.

That’s all very cool. What was your favorite role?

A: My favorite role is Big Daddy in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof because it was so not me. That was a great part to play because it caused me to stretch as an actor. And you favorite performance? A: My favorite performance was probably one night playing Atticus in To Kill a Mockingbird when everything went right and I truly lost myself in the character and didn’t think about lines, or acting, or blocking, or anything. The performance was practically over and I thought , what just happened. It was almost an out of body experience. Those rarely happen. Most acting ends up being mechanical. That’s just the reality of the business. So you cherish those moments when it happens.

And if you could share one really good anecdote with us, what would it be?

A: My favorite anecdote is the performance I watched of Jesus Christ Superstar in California, which was a professional company with amateurs involved and which some friends of mine were in the show. The short version of the story is an amateur actor happen to pick one of two spears that happen to be real ( why they had real spears with the fake spears is beyond me ) and struck the actor playing Jesus while he was hanging on the cross. Well, of course, that actor cried out in pain, using modern language, had to be taken down, ambulance had to be called, and he had to be taken to the hospital. Of course the show was stopped for some time. But you know the show must go on. So the understudy took over his part. But he was a different size and weight than the original actor playing Jesus. Why does that make a difference. In the last scene, as Jesus says his goodbyes to his disciples, the tech people had the actor rigged so he could be flown up into the heavens. Unfortunately, the weight system was set for the other actor. So on the first attempt of flight, Jesus flew halfway up, then came back down, because there was not enough weight on the pully system. So the actor states he has more to say to his disciples, while all the tech people off stage are trying to guess how much more weight to put on. They think they have the problem solved and relayed that to the actor. He says goodbye again and he flies up to the heavens. This time he gets 3/4s of the way up but comes back down. Needless to say more advice was given by Jesus, and more weight was added. Meanwhile I realize what is happening and I am laughing my head off. Finally it is time to fly again. But this time they have put too much weight on the system and Jesus flies to fast into the heavens and hits his head on the batton and his knocked out and is just hanging from the rafters practically. Ambulance is called and now we have two actors dressed as Jesus in the emergency room of the local hospital. The doctors are perplexed. Both actors made a full recovery. It was the wildest night of theatre I’ve ever experienced.

Man, that’s incredible! And then how did you got involved with Adventure House Players?

A: I was directing the show GRACE AND GLORIE and one of the actresses who is a great friend of mine was on the board of Adventure House. She asked me if I would be interested in the job of Artistic Director for the theatre troupe, that the position had just become open. They would have to of course advertise but she would really like me to apply if it would be something I might consider. The rest is history. Sweet, and so what does this involvement mean to you? A: The involvement is personal to me. I grew up in a family that was affected by mental illness. My father, who was a great man, husband, and a father, was a career military man, a very honorable man, but he suffered from depression the last seven years of his life and committed suicide by the time I was 19. I did not understand why he could not just snap out of it. I didn’t understand depression and to be completely honest neither did the mental health community or the public. He felt he was a failure as a man, father, and a husband. Of course I was a teenager and if he said the world was round, I would say the world was flat. To say we butted heads was an understatement. I remember one day thinking I need to get to know him, then thought I got plenty of time, I want to go party with my friends. A week later he was dead. To say I have felt guilt over these years is putting it mildly but I have forgiven myself but this involvement in Adventure House helps me to give something back. Even though I don’t have a degree in psychology, I feel I have actual experience of dealing with someone who suffered with a mental condition on a 24 hour basis ( and I realize it’s still a limited amount of exposure, because I’m not in their head ), but I have empathy. You can’t teach that in a class.

What projects are you all doing now?

A: The Adventure House Players will perform their play, THE INTERVIEW, at the Life Enrichment Center for the first time out in the public. We have been rehearsing, rehearsing, rehearsing!!! I think we are ready. We hope to be taking it to many civic organizations and socials to reach out to the community about not only the stigma of mental illness, but about jobs for our community of members. In fact that is the goal of that play, to try to find transitional employment opportunities for our members. They need jobs and we hope this works. Also I am in the play, TWELVE ANGRY MEN, which opened last night at Cleveland Community College. I have a small role, which is fine with me, but it is a great ensemble cast. The Players came to see the last dress rehearsal and they seemed to enjoy it. I WAS NERVOUS having them in the audience. It’s one thing telling them how to act, but another having them see you do it. But everything turned out alright. It was good for them to see that even small roles matter in a play. I really took the part because I was able to talk about the program in my bio and hopefully that will get more interest from the community about the Players.

Okay, anything else you’d care to share?

A: I have watched over this last year and a half, the members of the Adventure House Players go from being a scared group of people not knowing who I was and not knowing whether they could accept the challenge that they COULD be like any other acting troupe, like memorizing lines, becoming characters, not just themselves reading lines, attending the required rehearsal schedule whether they felt like or not, that they were part of an ensemble and had a responsibility to others, etc. We’ve had our two steps forward and one step back moments, but for the most part, it has been a success. For instance, one member has had a struggle memorizing lines for this play we are working on. But he has had the drive and motivation and last rehearsal HE GOT IT and in fact on the third time around he only missed one line and when I told him to go over that line, he said, ” Oh, you mean the line on the bottom of page 12.” That blew me away. It was almost like he had a photographic memory . Hell, I can’t even remember what page my lines are on when I’m trying to memorize lines as an actor. I had to check the page and of course he was correct. I WAS SO PROUD OF HIM!!!!!! That made all the work worth it. That’s why I took the job. They make me proud. His family will see him for the first time in a few weeks playing the part of a CEO of a company, dressed in a pinstripe suit. He can’t wait.

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 Adventure House of Shelby, Cleveland County, NC, was founded, in March of 1986, around the ideal of the Clubhouse Model Rehabilitation Program, in turn modeled upon Fountain House, a well known clubhouse in New York City. Within a few months, our attendance jumped to 22 members per day. We changed our name to Adventure House and established a very strong work-ordered day. We then began looking for a larger house to accommodate our growing membership. With the assistance of a coalition of four local banks, we purchased our current Clubhouse in October 1987. In February 1988, Adventure House began the first Employment Program for persons with Mental Illness in Cleveland County. Our Transitional Employment Program enabled many of our members to work real jobs for real pay with local employers. The Clubhouse often provides transportation supports to these jobs, as there is no public transportation in this rural community. In May 1989, Adventure House opened the first Supported Housing Program in North Carolina that utilized individual apartments. Since that time, our Clubhouse based Supported Housing Program has expanded to 33 apartments, all occupied by Adventure House Members. In 1991, Adventure House achieved another first. We were the first Clubhouse operated by a Mental Health Center, to become Free Standing. Since then, we have assisted a number of Clubhouses around the country to become independent of their auspice agency. Through the fund raising efforts of our Board of Directors, the original Clubhouse has been expanded twice. We are currently serving over 100 active members, with an average daily attendance of 70. This makes us one of the largest Clubhouses per population in the world.If you have any questions about the application process, you may e-mail Richard Carson or call 704 482-3370 Monday thru Friday 8:00 am to 4:30 pm EST. http://www.adventurehouse.org.