In less than two weeks, black/white will be presented to an audience.  I am deep in rehearsals now and by the end of the week we will be heading into tech.  It has been a bit of a whirlwind putting this play together, but as the days pass, the pieces are beginning to fall into place.  I often feel like a teacher when I am directing these plays as I am working with a volunteer cast.  I am giving them a lot of instruction and it’s great to see when they achieve a certain goal we have been working together for.

There are a few teachers in my in time in school that I would like to highlight today.  I am a graduate of York University with a BFA in Creative Writing (concentrating on playwriting and screenwriting).   I knew from a young age that I wanted to write (probably after I failed grade 3 and started writing short stories).  But for all those years in the education system (Gordon Elementary School, Centennial Secondary School and York University) there have been several teachers along the way who have inspired me.

I was never good at learning other languages and I struggled with French.  In grade 8, our class took a trip to Quebec and I did not have the funds to go.  My father had just been in a serious car accident and money was tight.  I will never forget the act of kindness my french teacher, Rossana Colonna showed when she paid for part of the trip for me to go.  

In high school, 3 teachers stick out for me:  Herbert Kah, John Barta and Don Lesco.  Herbert Kah was my English teacher who encouraged me in my writing and theatre endeavours.  John Barta was my drama teacher and he had a wild personality.    He was never afraid to tell me that my plays were at times melodramatic – honest criticism which has helped me to this day.  And Don Lesco was a creative writing teacher.  He commanded our attention.  Students never fooled around in his class, but we learned so much and did a ton of writing. 

At York, Vaclav Taborsky, taught me the fundamentals of  how to write a screenplay.  He told our class that when it came to film writing it had to be “on the wall”, which meant it was about action, movement, not necessarily dialogue.  You had to “see it”.  It is not theatre.  To this day, I often still struggle with too much dialogue in my screenplays.   Evan Cameron was my professor in 4^th year Screenwriting and he left us alone to write.  In fact I remember he told us that by 4^th year you better know how to write a script.  Evan liked my screenplays and his critique of my work encouraged me to keep writing.  Susan Cohen was a tremendous help when it came to writing essays.  I was a disaster when I wrote essays and Susan organized my ideas into a proper structure for essay writing.

Do you have a teacher that has left an impression on you?