Odessa College’s new Director of Theatre Josh Rapp has plans not only for productions on campus but to connect the community with the arts.
The Creative Works Festival is coming up March 25 and a production of “The Glass Menagerie” will be in April.
Rapp came to Odessa College in January.
Most recently, he was working professionally at Mad Cow Theatre in Orlando.
Its website says “Mad Cow Theatre is one of Orlando’s most respected professional theatre companies, presenting compelling works of theatre for a wide-range of audiences, with a passion for both classic and contemporary plays and musicals from the best of American and World literature.”
Rapp, who is from Nashville, Tenn., taught at the University of Southern Mississippi and was an adjunct at William Carey University in Hattiesburg, Miss.
Rapp earned a bachelor’s degree in dramatic arts and political science from Tennessee Tech in Cookeville, Tenn., and a master of fine arts in performance theatre from University of Southern Mississippi.
“I didn’t find theatre until I was an undergrad in college. I knew I needed an artistic outlet, but I didn’t know what it was and then I found the theatre and I fell in love with it and just did every show I could possibly get my hands on; Professionally, not professionally. I was working all the time and then I finished my degree …,” Rapp said.
He was studying physics, not theater when a professor and mentor asked Rapp to have coffee. Rapp said he couldn’t because he had a differential equations exam that he couldn’t skip.
Rapp was performing in “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” at the time. His director asked Rapp to come into the green room because there was something for him.
“There was a letter, a change of major form and a check and it just said, people have told you that you’re good enough, but I don’t think it was totally good enough to go do this. Go do what you’re meant to do. So I changed my major and I started studying theatre and I worked professionally. …,” he said.
“I did a lot of professional Shakespeare companies. I did a lot of repping; stuff like that. Then I just was ready to elevate. I wanted to be able to work half and half” as an educator and a performer, so that was the path Rapp pursued.
He earned his MFA and started applying for professorships.
“That’s how I cycled my time. I spent my nine month academic calendar here working as the director of theatre and then the summers and winters working professionally around the country,” Rapp said.
He added that being able to do both is important for his students and the community.
“I can’t teach something that I’m not doing. At least that’s my mentality. It’s also useful for (educating) … students. So when I walk into a room and I go, here’s something I heard in an audition; these are things that’ll be useful to you to getting cast …,” Rapp said.
If he gives students an example of what he heard in an audition, as opposed to reading about it, it has more impact.
“It’s a elevated level of education that I can provide them because I’m working in the same field that I’m training them to work towards,” Rapp added.
He said it also keeps him energized as an artist.
“… It’s important for that balance for me to still be able to work, create, perform and teach. It keeps both things balanced and keeps me creatively sparked in both areas,” Rapp said.
He’s a big fan of Golden Age musicals; a couple of examples are “Pal Joey” or “Oklahoma.”
“I think some of the topics are problematic just because of period but I think things like Guys and Dolls are really moving. I think they’re really palatable. But I also really enjoyed modernist works …,” Rapp said.
He added that he’s fascinated with a play called “Constellations” and he likes plays that are created with a cast in the room, a show is created and then it becomes a script.
One of his friends, Robert Icke, takes classics and reimagines them. Rapp said he wrote “1984,” based on the George Orwell novel.
He noted that he likes theater overall because he gets bored easily.
“Theater provides me with a creative, but also constructive academic outlet for everything to be different. …,” Rapp said.
During his standard day, he comes in and teaches students movement or yoga; he’ll attend board meetings; sit in on meetings for arts and culture in Odessa; then he’ll recruit, talking to students about what they’re passionate about.
“… Then maybe I’ll walk into the theater and my technical director needs to build something” and it has to be hands on, so he’ll take off his coat and help paint or build something.
“I go get a cup of coffee and I come back and I’m directing a play right now, so then I’m in the director’s chair doing that. I don’t know any other job that allows me to do a whole breadth of things within my day. That suits me well, because I like doing all of those things and I don’t have to just do one,” Rapp said.
He also enjoys the connection the theatre brings.
You may work with people intimately for eight weeks and never see them again, or you might, he said.
Rapp said the OC theatre department will host a celebration of arts at the Globe Theatre March 25 that will include a variety of arts. The event will be free and open to the public, he said.
Rapp said he has been working closely with Odessa Arts and its Executive Director Randy Ham to make that connection between the community and the arts.
The next show is Tennessee Williams’ “The Glass Menagerie.” It will have a cast of four.
“We’re in production for that right now. That is an Odessa College production,” Rapp said.
He will direct and produce “The Glass Menagerie” and Amanda Klipsch Fuquay will do the set design. Dates are April 28-30.
“I think it’s timely because it’s a memory play, and a dream of remembering … I found myself even personally experience a little dissociation with the last couple years just because things have been strange …,” Rapp said.
“I find myself in a phenomenon of going was that last year, was that two years ago. That’s why I find ‘Glass Menagerie’ really moving because it’s kind of adjacent to that … We play a little with the concept of time and so it’s a really lovely like accent to that. Also, it’s a classic which when I found out we hadn’t done … Tennessee Williams here in a long time, it just seems like now’s the perfect time. It’s a small cast. It’s a well run show. It’s well known. I think the community will really enjoy it. I just think it’s a really moving, lovely piece.”
“My actors are working really hard and are incredibly talented. I can’t speak of her enough, but Amanda Klipsch Fuquay, she’s the technical director here at Odessa, but she’s also a brilliant designer …,” he added.
His goals are investing in and rebuilding the sense of community and growing the program.
“… My goal for both this theater and for the community and arts in general … for the greater Odessa area is I want to create high quality enough work that it’s compelling for people to get involved in it” and students want to participate, Rapp said.
Currently, there are six theater majors. But ultimately, Rapp said he would like to bring on more faculty because that means more experiences for students.
“Obviously, our goal is to expand that but while it is a small cohort, it has its advantages. You have new faculty and the classroom sizes are incredibly one on one, which is useful in a studio. In bigger programs, you have to divide those sections into more sections with more faculty …,” Rapp said.
Chair of Visual and Performing Arts Eric Baker said they are excited to bring Rapp onto the team.
“He brings an energy and perspective that will continue the legacy of quality of the Odessa College theatre program,” Baker said in a text message.
