Frank Georgiana

I’ve been thinking about this post for a while; it turns out it’s harder to write than I had anticipated.

My friend, Frank Georgiana, died on November 22, 2009, at the age of 74. He was an actor and director in the Colorado theater community. You can read about his life here in the Denver Post.

I served as stage manager for a number of his productions with the Boulder Repertory Theater. And from Frank, I learned what it means to be an artist.

As stage manager, my job was to set the stage, lay out the props, coordinate lights & sound, make sure actors were in place for their entrances, communicate with the box office, play the occasional walk-on part, and clean up and repack after the show. In general, I was charged with making sure that thing ran smoothly behind the scenes — dispensing band-aids for unexpected cuts, safety pins to mend torn costumes, and once even arranging a trip to the hospital for someone who was having a heart attack.

Frank and his wife Ernestine had lived in New York and had seen more theater than I could begin to fathom. Oftentimes, after the stage was set, we’d break for a light dinner and Frank would tell us stories about the productions he had seen.

Frank and Ernestine witnessed Peter Brook’s groundbreaking production of “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” in 1970. And not just any performance of the show — they were present at the legendary performance in which the scenery caught fire. As the crew worked to put out the fire, a tremor of panic began to ripple across the audience, but moving quickly, the actor John Kane (staying in character as Puck) came down to the footlights to reassure the audience that they needn’t be afraid, the fire was a very small one, however, if anyone were the least bit frightened, they were welcome to excuse themselves and wait in the lobby with his solemn promise that the actors would not continue until everyone had returned to their seats. As a theater student I found reference to this production in my textbooks, but the story never came to life until I heard Frank and Ernestine tell it.

Frank would bemoan the fact that the raising of the curtain at the start of a show had lately fallen out of fashion. He felt it was crass to have your set on display before the play even began, cheating the audience out of the feelings of anticipation they receive while they wait for the curtain to rise. He told of a music and dance revue in which, after the orchestra had completed the overture, the curtain rose six inches and stopped, revealing a pair of tap-dancing feet. Then the curtain inched up a little further and two more dancers joined in the rhythm. Creeping up further the curtain revealed a half-dozen, then a dozen, then two dozen dancing legs joining the fray. By the time the curtain had risen to waist height, the stage was filled with hundreds of feet tapping out a furious clatter. And finally, when the curtain rapidly ascended to reveal a spectacular stage full of costumed dancers, the audience let loose with a roar of approval.

Another favorite story of Frank’s was of his seeing a play that featured a peculiar actress: young, frail, and mousy. The actress sat silently in a chair upstage, while all around her, the other actors drove the action of the play. But there was something compelling about her presence; Frank’s gaze was drawn to her like a magnet. Although she said nothing and remained confined to her chair, he couldn’t stop watching her. Then suddenly, as the first act came to a close, she convulsed in seizure and fell to the floor. And the audience erupted with screams of pandemonium, so riveting has been this actress’s performance. The actress was a very young Sissy Spacek.

More important than the stories, however, was Frank’s commitment and devotion to his art. A point that comes across only mutedly in the Denver Post article is that Frank held himself to the highest standards for all his work in the theater. He wasn’t on stage to feed his vanity. He wasn’t there to collect a paycheck. He was there seeking perfection. He could see clearly the deep power of theater to affect an audience, and he set the very highest standards for himself — and for those around him — as he embarked to bring his vision to life.

Working backstage on one of Frank’s productions would catapult me into a state of alert vigilance. I was always fearful of letting my guard down, of making a mistake. And while Frank was quick to anger and showed no tolerance for mistakes, it was not his anger that put me on edge.

What made me anxious and vigilant was that after all the time Frank had invested in bringing the production to life, after all the toil the actors had put into making Frank’s vision a reality, I could sense that he had brought us within striking distance of giving a perfect gift to the audience. And I was keenly aware that the slightest lapse of attention on my part could mar the production, could rob the audience, and could undermine all that we had worked to achieve.

Not everyone could endure the fiery heat of Frank’s passion, but for many of us, working with Frank brought out our best. Working with Frank made us fervent with the desire to create something beautiful, perfect, and worthy.

Working with Frank brought me to realize that I had been a dilettante, that my expectations had been too meager, that I needed to set my sights much higher.

He never settled for less than perfect. He was an inspiration.