I am tired.

I am tired of reading posts about “my rights” to a hobby that includes automatic rifles. You like guns, fine. But accept the fact that guns are dangerous and require strict regulations.

I am a teacher. I am tired because my job is hard. Don’t get me wrong, I love this gig, but it is hard work. It is emotionally draining, mentally challenging, and physically demanding. I am talking about a normal day here folks, and this past week was NOT NORMAL.

On top of all I do, I must also include drills where we hide in the theatre from a shooter. I must take time out of our day to discuss my students’ fears and concerns about their safety in our little town. I must plot with them strategies for when a shooter actually gets inside the theatre, what do we throw at them? I must remind them that if the fire alarm goes off to let me get to the door first to make sure there is no shooter out in the hall.

This last bothers me because normally I stay behind to look for stragglers and to shut doors. I must take time from my work to plan safety routes, and to devise strategies for my students for any given circumstance. What if someone is in the bathroom down the hall? What if it is lunchtime, which way should they run? What does gunfire sound like? What should I do first?

I can’t describe to you the silence that followed some comments about what to do if I, the teacher, do not return to the safe zone: “You shut the locked door and you stay quiet.” Yes, you forget about me and take care of each other, would you promise me that please?

The kids are terrified. Yesterday was even worse than Thursday, because of a threatening Snapchat, we were on alert. The phone lines were flooded with concerned parents, the halls had security and police patrolling. But you know what broke my heart? Sitting in my office working on my computer while I listened to our music teacher, a truly lovely man, kindly talking to his beginning level choir class, showing these young and frightened children how to cross the music hall to the band room as it is safer than the choir room.

As a teacher, I am privy to the emotional and mental health assessment of every student in my classroom. I am seeing more and more students suffering from debilitating anxiety and the label PTSD appears more and more often. THIS IS NOT OKAY.  It angers me that the rest of our country is so quick to judge kids without really understanding their motivations. Theatre teaches us to develop empathy, if only to understand our character and put on a better performance. I wish everyone was required to study theatre in school, if only to help them gain compassion – not just for others, but for themselves as well. Our country would be so much healthier for it.

Thank you so much, adults. On top of your own issues that plague my students thus making learning a difficult task already, you now have introduced terror into their daily classroom routine. Because of your inability to grow up and be responsible, unselfish and willing to sacrifice for others we are now living in this messed up, full of rage and extremely polarized country where children died because they attended school.

Rachel Harry received the 2017 Tony Award for Excellence in Theatre Education. She has taught theatre for 30 years at Hood River Valley High School in Oregon, and she also teaches at Columbia Gorge Community College. Much of this essay began as a Facebook post on February 17, 2018, following the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. It is reposted here by permission.

Having had a hand in The Tony Awards from 2004 through 2011, awards show-watching has been more than a pastime for me. But I’m a latecomer to The Olivier Awards. Two years ago I sat at home, watching the livestream in a window on my laptop. Last year, I finally accepted my annual invitation from the Society of London Theatres to attend in person. Earlier today, I spent four hours in the Jazz at Lincoln Center facility, where the livefeed of the Oliviers was shown on a large screen in Rose Hall, perhaps the city’s most unique venue, with views of Columbus Circle and Central Park behind the stage and, in this case, screen.  Today’s experience felt like an amalgam of my prior two: I was watching on a screen, but a big one which often brought the event to larger than life size; instead of calling out the winners to my wife in the other room, I was surrounded by several hundred theatre professionals and other guests.  This was the “NT Live” version of The Oliviers, so to speak.

I had expected the crowd to resemble “the usual suspects” seen at most opening nights, but it was an eclectic mix, with many folks I didn’t know. I spotted producers (Michael David of Jersey Boys, Sue Frost & Randy Adams of Memphis, Jed Bernstein of Driving Miss Daisy and Hal Luftig of Evita), some not-for-profit leaders (Teresa Eyring of the Theatre Communications Group and Victoria Bailey from the Theatre Development Fund), and a smattering of press (The New York Times, Playbill, Theatermania and AM New York). There was a large contingent from One Man, Two Guvnors there up through intermission (they had to depart for a 3 pm matinee), I don’t know how many from Ghost, Paulo Szot of South Pacific, and James Earl Jones.

It is impossible to know how many attendees had seen some, or any, of the nominated shows (I had seen only four), so an obvious question was whether one would feel any “rooting interest” in the room. Certainly the Guvnors crowd applauded heartily as their nominations were announced, but that was the only apparent partisanship in the room (and completely appropriate). What pleasantly surprised me was that the audience did respond as if at a live show, instead of a cinema; there was applause at the end of every musical number performed, all of which came off well on the big screen. If not the same as being there, there was the unifying effect that experiencing entertainment in a large group can bring; there was definitely a frisson of excitement when Matthew Warchus accepted his award live in New York – made even more exciting by it taking place just seconds after the briefly interrupted video feed came back online.

Andre Ptasyzynski’s opening remarks playfully hinted at rivalry between Broadway and the West End – he cited 14 million London admissions last year vs. Broadway’s 12.5, but also noted $1 billion in New York revenues against London’s $800 million, and also differentiated between voting rules for The Oliviers and The Tonys. But the prevailing spirit was of a carefree spring afternoon in London (even if it was nighttime there). The U.S. audience might have benefited from a few annotations by voice or on screen (Collaborators author John Hodge was never identified by name), and it was my sense that even with an introduction, the crowd neither understood who Ronan Keating and Kimberley Walsh were or why they were dropped into the middle of the event’s second act. Presenters from Downton Abbey needed no such identification.

Too often, in the press surrounding both The Oliviers and The Tonys, there’s an effort to stoke the fires of national competition. I’ve always thought it a false construct. This initial large scale opportunity for the New York theatre to join together for the Oliviers was a good first step and reinforced what I have always found to be true: the underlying unity of all theatre communities, wherever they may be and whoever wins their awards.

Ian McKellen (with Janet Suzman) in the 1981 film “Priest of Love,” which McKellen was promoting when this interview took place.

The following article was my first effort at writing journalism and the first celebrity interview I ever conducted; I reproduce it intact, save for addressing some non-existent copy editing and failed proofing. After trying to break into writing for the entertainment magazine at my university’s newspaper throughout my freshman year, I was given this assignment early in my sophomore year by the entertainment editor because, in his words, “We’ve been offered an interview with Ian McKellen and nobody here knows who he is.”  Obviously that is unimaginable now, but this was 1981, years before The Lord of The Rings and the X-Men films. Given the path of my theatrical career in the 30 years that followed, there’s tremendous irony in many of my subject’s comments in the first part of the interview; I had completely forgotten them. The thrill of this interview came full circle in 2010, when I recorded an hour-long podcast with Sir Ian in London, even referencing this interview during that conversation.

“As an actor I certainly learn as much from bad acting as I do from good acting, perhaps rather more. It’s easier to see what’s gone wrong when it’s bad,” muses Ian McKellen, discussing the Broadway season which he dominated with his performance in Amadeus. He pauses, thinking. “There must’ve been something I really enjoyed…I think it was a rather lean year and it’s difficult to recommend for most of the people. It seems as usual that as far as plays go, Off-Broadway is more productive than Broadway.” So how does McKellen react to the fame he garnered through his Best Actor in a Play Tony Award for Amadeus while aware of his lack of competition?

“Well, it’s very nice, isn’t it? I try not to believe it,” chuckles McKellen, “because it doesn’t really make any sense. The best dressed man, the most beautiful baby, the most glamorous grandmother…The Best Actor. There is such determination that through The Tony Awards, seen by 250 million people throughout the world, that New York should be advertising its pre-eminence in the show biz stakes. It is a sort of publicity event to publicize New York. And as New York’s fortunes have dipped in the past few years, so the Tonys’ have come up. When one understands that one is caught up in that, it’s easier to keep a sense of proportion.”

Countering this critical view, McKellen continues, “However, everyone is so pleased on your behalf, in England, in the press, the people I meet in the streets. Everyone in New York concerned with getting on seems to see Broadway and anyone who’s on Broadway as a symbol of their own success. It’s wonderful; they’re terribly pleased for you. They’re not envious, they just want to come shake your hand. I think it sort of confirms that they’re on the right lines, that the American Dream won’t die if you work hard enough and, with a bit of luck, you’ll make it.”

McKellen can afford such ideals. A six-year fixture in the Royal Shakespeare Company, a Broadway star in Amadeus and now a film star in Priest of Love (portraying novelist D.H. Lawrence), it would seem that McKellen could well be the next Olivier or Scofield. But he retains a certain humility, casually observing the newfound glitter in his life and the actions of others in the same situation.

“I was backstage with Elizabeth Taylor at The Tony Awards and she was drinking a glass of champagne. She was the only person there who was and I asked her for a sip and she said, ‘You’re going to share a glass with a loser?’ She felt she had lost. It really won’t do if you’re in the business.”

McKellen, coming from a mining town in northern England, began his love of theatre early, acting in amateur productions and going to all the shows he could. But English Lit at Cambridge interfered and McKellen avoided Drama out of insecurity. “I’d seen far too many good actors and I didn’t think I was good enough to be a pro. But one or two people said I was, so I thought I’d give it a whirl. And I’m still whirling.”

That whirling spun McKellen into the Royal Shakespeare Company and then into the London production of Bent, originating the role of Max, the homosexual concentration camp victim made famous in the U.S. by Richard Gere. From Bent he whirled in Amadeus. As Antonio Salieri, the embittered rival of Wolfgang Mozart, McKellen carved a theatrical figure which remains permanently etched on one’s memory. And yet, “It’s the kind of performance which at home I’ve really tried to stop giving,” he notes. Elaborating, McKellen compares the part to 19^th century British drama where “reality was more displayed. It was safe to say,” and he bellows, “’The bells, the bells, the bells!’ It was absolutely alright. You know, ‘God’s in his heaven and he’s an Englishman.’ Now we’re not quite so certain about things. It’s a bit more neurotic.” And McKellen prefers the latter style, “this other level of reality.”

This reality is easier to portray in films and that is McKellen’s new direction. Though no plans or contracts are on the horizon, he hopes to work more in movies, since Priest of Love is his first film in 13 years and his first starring role.

“It was a bit unnerving to get up each morning, touch up the beard, dye the hair red, put on the 1920s clothes, look in the mirror and say, ‘Well, good morning D.H. Lawrence.’ But it also feels quite good to walk onto a set and people refer to you as Lawrence rather than as Ian. It’s a bit of a compliment.”

Clearly enamored of the character of D.H. Lawrence, McKellen expresses many views on Lawrence’s life, his portrayal and his own life.

“I can understand all the constrictions which he felt in that small northern community. The puritanicalism which he kept throughout his life, which I’ve got inside of me, which I keep measuring myself up against.”

“There was another strand of his character that was very appealing to me, for me to be understandable of course, is that he loved acting. He loved the music hall, the red-nosed comics, vaudeville. He was obviously often aware of the effect he was having. He wasn’t the retired little actor.”

“There was evidence that Lawrence’s heterosexuality wasn’t as secure as he presented it. There were many young men in his life that he was obviously attracted by, not saying that he slept with them. I don’t think he ever admitted to himself that he could be a homosexual, but I think he was. Or maybe bisexual, but  not practicing.” More personally, he adds, “I don’t see much difference between homosexuality and heterosexuality. They seem to be about the same. If you’re in love, you’re in love. If you’re having sex, you’re having sex.”

Despite his fame and brilliance, Ian McKellen remains personable and direct. In discussing Lawrence’s attraction to his wife and hers to him, he remarks, eyes sparkling, “Oh well, maybe they just liked fucking.”