Three years. An MFA, ABD PhD, a new wife, phenomenal friendshps and show after show. If you survive the Hilberry and still want to do this for a living, you're probably meant to.

Having auditioned on crutches (following an accident in jazz class--another story), I landed a spot in the Hilberry Repertory Theatre Company at Wayne State University. In those days it was a true rep company in that we did real "rolling rep". Eight shows in the winter, and five more in the summer months. We usually got a show or two off, and played leads as well as walk-ons. It's the best training any actor could possibly get. I was apparently welcomed in to replace John Stirling Arnold, the character man, who had decided to move on to more lucrative pastures, but ironically, I was cast as the juvey in the first show, Ferenc Molnar's The Play's the Thing. For a number of reasons, a switch was soon made and I played mostly "character" parts for the next three years. And leads. Harpagon, Freddy Rolfe, Hamlet, etc. A rollicking good time.

The shows and the roles in no particular order (who can remember) were:

The Play's the Thing	Dwornitschek
The Crucible	Giles Corey
The Ruling Class	Bishop Lampton
Julius Caesar	Casca
Tartuffe	M. Loyale
The Magistrate	Colonel Luken
The Devil's Disciple	General Burgoyne
The Lady From Maxim's	Mongicourt
Hadrian VII	Hadrian
Medea	Tutor
The Mousetrap	Christopher Wren
Johnny Moonbeam	Medicine Man
The Tenth Man	Hirschman the Cabalist
The Man of La Mancha	Sancho Panza
The Good Doctor	Chekhov
The Time of Your Life	Kit Carson
The Miser	Harpagon
As You Like It	Jacques
Hamlet	Reynaldo, Osric
Hamlet	Hamlet