Howdy! I’m Evan, and this is my third season acting as a company member with Princeton Summer Theater. My first summer with PST was in 2012, just after my sophomore year of Princeton. During the school year I’d performed in several shows with student groups and with the Lewis Center, but the twelve-hour days of PST were far more demanding than my previous schedules. Although I was (and still am) a little overwhelmed by the rigor of our program, I quickly fell in love with the community that we created together.

Community is a word that gets bandied around a lot, especially on college campuses. The Princeton community, the theater community, the communities of eating clubs – they’re all groups of people with something in common, and they all have the potential to help their members grow and develop meaningful relationships. But where these groups allow members a degree of flexibility in their commitment, PST requires an intensity of focus. A full half of our day is spent rehearsing together, preparing and eating meals together, and operating the theater together. Of the remaining twelve hours, what we don’t spend sleeping is likely to be spent relaxing together after a hard day’s work. We binge watch Orange is the New Black, play games, and celebrate our latest shows. PST linked togetherness and community for me with a clarity that I had never experienced before.

Although most of us in the company and board of PST were friends before this summer, we’re already much closer because of the time that we’ve spent together these last two weeks. We’re creating another beautiful, tight-knit, weirdo artist colony much like we had in my past summers. Every show that you see us put up is a product of that community, and a testament to its strength. I’m overjoyed to be part of this crazy adventure once again!

Cheers,

-Evan