ANNOUNCEMENT: SPRING 2024

I will be playing PROFESSOR BHAER in the 2024 National Tour of LITTLE WOMEN, produced by BIG LEAGUE PRODUCTIONS.

The place to see all of the stops on the tour and get tickets is littlewomentour.com.

"I'd Be Delighted" to share this wonderful story with you!

If you’re interested, below is a little more context of how this came about and what you can expect from the website going forward.

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After Heidi and I moved to New Jersey in August of 2022, our acting careers were somewhat in flux. We had just finished our final performances as Arizona based actors, she in Daddy Long Longs and myself in A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder. We were married March 31st, 2023, and she was auditioning and submitting for New York shows by April 12th. She hit the ground running, but I needed to pause for a minute. Not only did I need to work a real-person job to help make up our wedding money, but I wanted to reevaluate who I was as an artist and what I wanted to create.

You see, after graduating from AMDA in 2017, I had lived in Manhattan and worked as an actor for the better part of a year. I found some middling success, participating in staged readings, concerts, and cabarets here and there, but was limited by what work was available. I was a nobody right out of school, so I’m obviously grateful for every opportunity that was presented to me, but no project scratched that itch I had in the back of my head. I wanted to do challenging, underground, provocative, experimental, and that wasn’t available to me just yet. Life’s challenges took me away from New York to Arizona, back home, before I could find my place in the machine, find my people.

Returning to the New York acting scene with Heidi after being gone six years meant starting over. This was my chance to solidify my technique and set some ultimate goals. I wasn’t confident in my audition material, so I spent dedicated time looking for out-of-the-box songs to stand out from the pack. I read hundreds of plays so I could understand when something is “Chekhovian,” and read playwrighting books so future plays could be called “Leverage-esque.” I felt like Bruce Wayne, disappearing into anonymity to travel the world, studying and training for when he finally sets out on his mission. I wanted… yes… I wanted to be the Batman of theatre.

While I was on hiatus, Heidi was auditioning non-stop, and boy oh boy did she book. I knew she was an amazing actress as soon as I read with her at our callback for Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, and thankfully, New York is gradually learning about her wonderful talent, too. While she was working on workshops, and directing two High School shows, and performing in an Off-Broadway musical, I was in the audience cheering her on, but missing acting more and more.

CUT TO: Late September of last year, there was a notice for a non-equity tour of Little Women, accepting submissions from all over the country. Heidi brought it to me and suggested that it would be a great way to dangle my feet and get back into the swing of things. Plus, the time to tour would be now, when we don’t have any major responsibilities, like raising theoretical children. I gave it a shot. I recorded my song, read some lines, and joined the other 800 or so people who submitted themselves via email for consideration. Like I said, dangle my feet.

Things were looking bleak because, you know, casting had to go through over EIGHT HUNDRED emails, a majority of which were hopeful attempts at playing two of the most coveted roles of recent musical history, Jo and Laurie. Every acting message board was abuzz with speculation and confusion. “When will we hear? Any offers go out yet? Why doesn’t my video have any views?” Eventually, I shrugged it off. I’d taken the leap and tried, and that’s all I set out to do.

CUT TO: Late October, Heidi texts me while I was at work, saying she had what she thought was very good news. That night, she told me the creative team was doing another round of auditions, this time an in-person open call specifically looking for the roles of Jo, Laurie, and Professor Bhaer.

I’ll be honest, I was skeptical. For me, recording a self-tape is a stressful, unnatural process. Without fail, after a dozen tries at getting the audition “perfect,” I’m forced to send in a recording that doesn’t feel genuine. We’re acting for the stage, not for film, but self-tapes are the most convenient way for actors to be seen for projects and are now something of an industry standard. I didn’t want to put myself through any hopeful stress again, and waiting outside at 5 in the morning to sing a tight 16 bars felt like a step backward.

I went to the gym to blow off some steam and process. After a long conversation with Heidi about efficacy and self-worth and possibility, I decided to go for it. I showed up outside Ripley-Grier studios, over-tired and over-dressed. Again, and I mean this, I was only there to get back in the swing of things. My first audition in two years, my first New York audition in six. This is the way this is done and you’re doing it, that’s all you can expect from yourself.

Out of nearly 200 more hopefuls, I was cast.

It still doesn’t feel real to me, like, at all. The last few months have been an exciting blur of keeping this secret a secret and planning the best I can for an uncertain future. What books am I going to want to read? How am I going to feed myself? Where the heck is Indiana, anyway???

After our first rehearsal, I came home to the lovely Heidi, nearly in tears, saying how I don’t think I can do this. Living out of a suitcase while my wife is alone in the big scary city is a frightening thought. I felt like I was thrown into the deep end before I learned to swim. I felt like, feel like, I am a fraud, and I am going to be found out. But she reassured me, the way she always does, and talked me off the ledge, the way she has many times before. We are in an industry rife with uncertainty and speculation, with self-doubt and one-upmanship. No matter what I may think of myself from time to time, I am in the room, and I belong there. I got the job, now I get to do the job.

So there you have it! Rehearsals are already underway, and then we open in Kentucky just two days after I turn 27. I hope now you can see why this website was urgently necessary. Going forward, I can be a little less secretive in the Weekly Updates, and I will eventually launch another series of blog posts specifically to catalog what it’s like being on the road. Thank you so much for reading to the end, and I hope we’ll be traveling to a city near you so we can share what is bound to be a wonderful show.

And scene.

#LittleWomenNationalTour2024