on Coaster, val Theater with me, so when I got 10 Hollywood, I was ready." Scott Parker, Portland actor and teacher, said the 1975 Coaster season was the pivotal year for him, and the play "little Foxes" a personal breakthrough as an actor. "Jack came in with such a professional attitude and with incredible energy which is very contagious. I found myself working much harder and trying harder without even knowi ng it." Parker and many others have continued their association with Featheringill. "People come here (to PSU and summer theater) just to work with him, and they stay." That sense of continuity and quality which has marked the Coaster program will make the transition to lincoln Hall somewhat easier. In a sense, Featheringill is bringing the program and the performers back home. But that doesn't mean it will be a simple matter. "I don't think it's going to be one bit easy," Featheringill says. "It will be very much up·hill, up·stream." But for the director of the new PSU Summer Festival Theater Company - ilnd for theater in Portland - the risks are worth taking. (left) Terry Dav;s (now Terence knox) and kelly Brooks in "A Streetc..r Named Desire," 1976, (Below) Kelly Brooks, Patty Hunter, Susan leClerc and Victoria Parker in "The Madwoman of Chail1ol," 1979. {Bottom ~ft} On the set of "The Walll of the Toreadors," 1982, the third Featherinsill·directed play to be selected for presentation at the American Col~e Theatre Festival in Washington, D.C. (Bottom right) Seo" Parker, Victoria Parker and Patty Hunter in "A Delicate Balance," 1919. Scenes from Coaster Past N.Y. to find variety at PSU "Fiddler on the Roof," "Music Man," "How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying," "Walking Happy," "li'l Abner," and more, including "The Sudden .1nd Accidental Re-educalion of Horse Johnson." What? "Oh, yes, 'Horse Johnson, II, Featheringi!! deadpans. "Three days at the Belasco in New York. We opened on Thursday, closed on Saturday. I didn't think we'd lasl through Friday." "I was very lucky," he says of his 16·year career in New York, a period he describes as exciting and rewarding. "There are many things about Broadw.1Y that I miss severely, but it's a matter of a balance sheet." The work was rewarding, particularly financially, but "not personally satisfying. What I found mosl y tisfying was the teaching and directing summer stock theaters." He decided, ailer a lengthy personal reassessment, to try the academic world. "It started as something I was going to try for a year or two," he says. "I even retained my apartment in New York for years, never really thinking of myself as split from there." He arri ... ed at Portland State in 1970 and directed six shows in his first year, including four at the beach. He hasn't stopped since, a real departure from the routine of Bro.1dway. "When you are production stage manager with a show," he says, "you have to stick with it for a long period of time and thc routine becomes limiting. Now, I may have to handle six or eight scenes with students in acting class in a day. I have to deal with Shakespeare, O'Neill, many writers... different material e...ery day. Tlmt uses me, from my point of view, much more fully than continuing to keep the same show running," This year, on top of rro<!Signing the summer season and taking on two shows himself, Featheringill has directed one main stage production (Victoria Parker in "Medea"), served as head of the Theater Arts Department, and maintained his teaching schedule. He was looking for variety - and he got it. 9
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