1976 (Faculty) Alan Clarey

1976: Webster University (St. Louis, MO) as an Artist-In-Residence, Head of Voice & Speech, directed student productions. Resident actor with Repertory Theatre of St. Louis, resident Dialects coach, over 40 productions in 9 years. Free-lance actor doing over 200 commercials, voice-overs and industrial films in the St. Louis market, and one NBC Miniseries, “Cross of Fire” with William Hurt. St. Louis Area Liaison for Actors Equity for 13 years.

1992: Made a logical jump into sales. Western Regional manager for American Showcase. Hired, trained and scheduled reps into Montgomery Ward stores in 10 states. Travelled all the time and, oh joy, became intimate with Motel 6.

1996: Saw the demise of Montgomery Ward coming and joined Health Craft, a company that sold cookware at Home & Garden shows. Fed up with motels, I bought a small travel trailer and took my bedroom on the road with me as I travelled throughout California, Idaho, Washington, Oregon, Arizona, New Mexico and Nevada selling cookware.

2000: Traded in the trailer on a 39’ diesel motorhome, became a “full-timer.” (In RV lingo, that’s someone who lives in their RV.)

2003: Director of Marketing for Vista Resorts. Travelled to RV Shows promoting the company and establishing relationships with over 40 RV dealerships in our marketing area. Also managing one of the company’s two campgrounds, Canyon Creek Resort in Winters, CA. I designed and manage the company database, troubleshoot their computer problems, manage the website and email accounts and do all of the marketing writing and graphics work for the company. (Self-taught in Adobe Photoshop and InDesign.) I still work with the remaining RV dealerships in the area, about 25 now as the rest of them went belly-up during the last 2 years. I use my sister’s address as an official “residence,” but actually live on the resort grounds in my motorhome. Upside, free rent. Downside, people knocking on my door 24/7.

Of all the things I’ve done in my life, the classroom and coaching actors was the most personally rewarding, and the Playhouse the fondest of my memories.