From 1985 to 1990 I was the Managing Director at Pegasus Players Theatre (now known as Pegasus Theatre Chicago) and prodcued some thiry shows there.

I was the first Chicago producer to offer a play by August Wilson, “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” which ran for two years and introduced the great Harry Lennix to audiences and launched hos spectacular careeer.

My proudest contribution to Chicago’s cultural scene was the creation of the Chicago Young Playwrights Festival in 1986. We added it a regular feature of our five-play subscription season and I set up a system of recruiting young authors, professional reviewers of the submitted texts, and a low-cost matinee series so teens could see the plays. The first season we got around 135 entires. Each play is to be a one act or run around 20 minutes. They are all read and critiqued by theater professionals. A final group of authors receive awards and recogntion with the four winners receiving a full production where the young authr is coached by a published author and included in the rehearsal and re-writing process. In 2024 the theater will produce the 37th edition of the Ferstival! I estimate that over 20,000 teens have submitted plays. Winners have gone on to become teachers, scholars, authors, operators of nonprofits, and have reported that winning the YPF has changed their lives.

I worked for the amazing Arlene Crewdson, the founder and Artistic Director of Pegasus. I remain in awe of her passion, determination, and pure guts to create live theater and make that work available to the widest possible audience. She sought out, encouraged, and supported all sorts of new talent – writers, designers, and directors. She became internationally known for resurrecting musicals by Stephen Sondheim. When I got to Pegasus in the Spring of 1985, they were wrapping up their landmark revival of “Merrily We Roll Along” which is on Bradway right now (December 2024). She was devoted to Sondheim’s work and a real breakthrough occured when she engaged the amazing director Victoria Bussert to direct “Pacific Overtures” in 1986, with musical director by the equally amazing Jeffrey Lewis. The next year the creative team re-united to produce the never before seen (except at a student production at Yale) of “The Frogs” which was staged in Truman College’s Olympic pool. I called it “Chicago’s Splash Hit Musical!” and it was.

I suppose you could say I was the one of most successful off-Loop producers in recent memoery as I has three plays running at the same time – TWICE! I introduced the flex pass concept to ticket and subscription sales. When I started at Pegasus there were about 220 subscribers, when I left there were over 1,500. I introduced the use of computers to the administration and offered the first HMO health care plan to all of our workers and performers. I started an ad co-op that was eventually given to the League of Chicago Theaters to administer. I pioneered the idea of co-production and by the time I left in 1990, each of the five plays in our season had either a for-profit or nonprofit co-production partner, effectively cutting our production budget by one fifth and adding a range of creative co-marketing collaborators. We also produced murder mysteries and corporate theater and operated a wildly successful touring program that took entertainers to senior centers throughout the region. I also expanded Arlene’s signature community outreach program that gave away hundreds of tickets to clients of local social service organizations annually.