Spotlight On...Christopher Richards '03 Senior Actor Made for the Stage

Author: Lucie Greene

The range of talent at Middlebury College is often taken for granted or at least forgotten in our hectic day-to-day life.
It's funny to hear people drop into conversations that they were the Olympic finalist for gymnastics a year before or the chief founder of an organization to help disadvantaged children learn English - achievements spoken of as nonchalantly as if they were describing having gone on vacation or taken a senior seminar.
This was particularly striking upon meeting Christopher Richards '03, a lead in the faculty show "The Memorandum" and director of the recent adaptation of "4.48 Psychosis." With casual banter, between discussing coffee favorites and English slang (after his time spent in England), he mentioned just a few small facts about his accomplishments.
These being (of course mentioned very modestly) that he was the highest paid actor in Minneapolis before coming to the College, that he's acted with the Royal Shakespeare Company in England during his year abroad and that he gained admission to Columbia University's Master of Fine Arts acting program.
Over the aforementioned coffee and banter, The Middlebury Campus wanted to see if any more of these little instances would drop into conversation. Oscars? Golden Globes? Who knows.
The Middlebury Campus: So Chris, where are you from?
Christopher Richards: I've lived in a suburb of Minneapolis, Minn. all of my life.
The Campus: And how did you first get interested in acting?
C.R.: Minneapolis has a fantastic theater community. They used to have the most theaters per capita of any city in the United States, with the exception of New York City, of course! When I was little my parents would take me to the theaters in town. They just seemed to be these incredible, magical places.
The Campus: When you got to Middlebury, how did you first get involved?
C.R.: I worked for the Guthrie Theater when I was a senior in high school and was being recruited by some theater conservatories.
However, I had been doing shows so much that I was at the risk of being an actor whose art imitated art. You know? Since I didn't have many experiences outside of the theater community. The director of casting there recommended Middlebury, based on its reputation for turning out intelligent, skilled actors.
Once I got here I wanted to do things right away but I couldn't get cast to save my life! It was really depressing after doing so well in Minneapolis.
In my first semester as a freshman I hadn't been cast in the freshman show but I had a call asking me to return to Minneapolis to do a new work by John Guare, the playwright behind "Six Degrees of Separation." (Translation: a big deal.)
Part of the problem was that I looked so young, and I have a very specific type that doesn't work well for a lot of shows that students were doing here. Andy Mitton, a great playwright, though, and young director, took a chance on me during my sophomore year though. And things took off from there, I suppose.
The Campus: You've also spent time abroad haven't you? How did you find that? What sort of experiences did you gain?
C.R.: Part of the reason I decided to go abroad and not take the role I had been cast in the faculty show was that I was offered the opportunity to study with Royal Shakespeare Company in England (through my connections with the Guthrie Theater).
But going abroad I knew would be a fantastic experience no matter what. I didn't know how much theater I would end up doing, but once the year was over I did three shows there: Wilde's "Salome," "Spring Awakening" and "Sexual Perversity in Chicago."
Actors and directors tend to go about things a bit differently there. There's less of this obsession with emotional commitment and honesty and a different, more relaxed approach. American actors seem to have better training but they aren't pragmatic like the Brits are.
There's often too much "going back to that painful moment in your dead grandmother's kitchen" and not enough of what actually works onstage.
Theater in Britain I think is a bit more vibrant than the mainstream theater here. It seems very socially conscious, progressive and engaging. I was really excited by the community there, and I'd like to go back and work.
The Campus: You just finished the run of "The Memorandum," the faculty show. Did you enjoy doing that?
C.R.: "The Memorandum" has been an interesting experience for me. I prepared the role in a way that was very outside-in. I would start with certain gestures and motions, as well as specific actions, physically discovering the character first before informing those choices with emotional justification later.
Usually I work in the opposite direction, but partially [Director] Richard [Romagnoli's] style and the chameleonic qualities of the character I was playing dictated this as the way to go about it.
The Campus: Where do you see yourself headed?
C.R.: Next year I'll be at Columbia in New York pursuing my MFA in acting. It's a great program and I'm excited to be a part of it. Anne Bogart, Andrei Serban and Kristin Linklater - three very important progressive theater minds - are the main teachers in the program.
The program is based on experiment and play. I doubt that I'll be one of those actors headed for film or TV. Theater is what I love and what I think is the most fulfilling for me. I would like to work in a socially conscious theater - something I think Broadway and the mainstream repertory theaters avoid too much.
I mean, how can we have a theater for the people when Broadway tickets cost over 100 bucks for the cheap seats?
I also worry that theater isn't establishing itself as enough of a separate and distinct art form. Strict naturalism and other elements are often something that can be better achieved by film.
Theater has specific abilities that make it unique and vital as an art form and part of its the collective experience it has with its audience. I want to do work that both serves and provokes the audience.
The Campus: Well, good luck.
C.R.: Thanks.