The house lights are finally rising on five Taylor Theatre seniors, signaling the end of a four-year run filled with more props, costumes and performances than one could count.
Musical theatre major Gavin Kastner, theatre arts majors Eva Reitzig, Grace Anne Crews and Miriam Schaffer and theatre and English education major Hannah Wylie have all spent their college careers carefully weaving together the narratives found in plays and musicals that graced the Mitchell Theatre stage.
Throughout their four years, these students have spent countless hours becoming proficient in many areas of theatrical production, developing a well-rounded education in their craft.
Mimi Schaffer, theatre arts senior, having taken on multiple production staff roles throughout her educational career, acknowledged the breadth of knowledge this fully formed education gave her.
“Something fundamental in theater is you can’t just know one specific thing. You need to know a little bit of everything,” she said. “The education that I’ve gotten here — of getting to know a little bit of everything — has really played into that.”
While unsure what is in store post-graduation, Schaffer feels confident in the education that Taylor University has given her, she said.
Eva Reitzig, theatre arts senior, echoed this sentiment, noting that this growth is not found exclusively in technical skills, but also in one’s character.
Reitzig hopes to engage in either stage management or dramaturgy work in North Carolina or Washington, D.C., in the coming months.
“Theater has been a space where I can learn and grow as a person and as an artist, and it’s been a space where I can be myself,” she said. “There’s been so much that I’ve learned in this space and so many ways that I’ve grown, and I really do think it’s because of the theater and because of Tracy (Manning) building the community.”
As professors build a community within the department, they also build personal relationships with their students, speaking into their lives and encouraging them to reach for excellence in their craft.
Professors, especially Tracy Manning, managing and artistic director of theatre and assistant professor of theatre arts, often stretch students — sometimes beyond what the student thought they could imagine, Kastner said, which brings enormous growth.
Fellow students within the department often grow close over a production process, spending time together through long technical rehearsals and cast bonding experiences.
These experiences, while not necessarily theatrical in nature, are deeply valuable at a relational level, Crews said.
“Through loving what we’re doing, we love each other,” she said, “And theatre has been really influential in teaching me how to love well.”
Grace Anne Crews, theatre arts senior, is looking forward to a summer in Georgia while she interns at a dance company, teaching theatre classes. From there, she has some travel in store and plans to audition or work at professional theaters near her.
Outside of the theater quadrant, the liberal arts education Taylor students receive plays into the formation of their thoughts and feelings, which are then infused into the theatrical work they create, Wylie said.
“The art I make is deeply impacted and shaped and influenced by the creative, intellectual, thoughtful, academic work that’s happening around me, as well in my math class, my science class, the art exhibit I see, the music I listen to, the philosophy class I’m in for a gen ed,” she said. “All of those can contribute to the art I do, and speak into the conversations I have.”
As Hannah Wylie, theatre/english education major, looks to the future, she hopes to find a job in education, specifically in the English and theater worlds.
This may mean working as a missionary teacher, but for now, God is in control of what road she pursues, she said.
For Gavin Kastner, a musical theatre major, the intersection of academic classes with real-world experience in his artistic discipline has cultivated both a plethora of tools to rely upon and a mindset of both resilience and ingenuity. He views the uncertainty of the post-graduation world not as a barrier, but as a challenge he is yet to face.
“This is my motto: pursue the open doors,” he said. “Knock on the doors that I desire to, but pursue the ones that are open.”
As Kastner finishes his final semester in the fall, he uses this saying to guide his next steps of continuing to audition, hopefully in Chicago, and eventually, New York City. An audition is quite different from a typical job interview, but it is an experience his training has prepared him for, Kastner said.
As the curtain falls on these seniors’ time at Taylor, they leave a legacy of faith-infused artistry — something they will carry with them as they pursue whatever path God paves for them next.
