The Theatre and Drama Program
The Dearborn High School (DHS) Theatre program is one of the oldest and most highly honored secondary level theatre programs in the state of Michigan, with a tradition of fine theatrical performances dating back to the turn of the 20th century. The oldest continuous theatre program of any kind in the City of Dearborn, DHS is also the home of International Thespian Troupe #586 which was chartered at the school in 1944. The program's most famous alumnus was the actor George Peppard (class of 1946) who co-starred with Audrey Hepburn in the motion picture Breakfast at Tiffany's as well as such films as The Blue Max and The Carpetbaggers, appeared on Broadway in many plays including Barefoot in the Park, and starred in the television series Banacek and The A-team. Other notable graduates of the theatre program include stage and screen actor David Wayne Parker (the film Escanaba in da'Moonlight), film maker Stephen Taylor-Wehr, actor and television and film producer Mike Mosallam, and working professional stage actors Thad Avery, Brent Bradley, Laura Downes, Kira Frabutt, Sarah Leahy, Matios Simonian, Jackie Strez, and Greg Phillip Viscomi, who moved from a career on the stage into theatre education, becoming the DHS Theatre program's director in 1994, a position he continues to hold, making him the longest serving theatre director in the school's history. The program has been honored with 10 consecutive nominations (2000–2010) to perform at the annual American High School Theatre Festival and at the prestigious International Thespian Festival, numerous State of Michigan Thespian theatre competition medalists and scholarship winners, and by far the most Dearborn Press and Guide Newspaper Entertainment (PAGE) Awards of any high school theatre program in the city's history. 3 Theatre Program Alumni have been inducted into the City of Dearborn's Theatre Hall of Fame representing DHS; Peppard, Viscomi, and former director, designer, and teacher Joan Arrick, the current DHS Director of Theatre Emeritus. The program presents an average of three fully staged productions each school year. For more information, go to Dearborn High Theatre: The Fan Page on FACEBOOK.
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Famous quotes containing the words theatre, drama and/or program:
“... in the happy laughter of a theatre audience one can get the most immediate and numerically impressive guarantee that there is nothing in one’s mind which is not familiar to the mass of persons living at the time.”
—Rebecca West (1892–1983)
“By whatever means it is accomplished, the prime business of a play is to arouse the passions of its audience so that by the route of passion may be opened up new relationships between a man and men, and between men and Man. Drama is akin to the other inventions of man in that it ought to help us to know more, and not merely to spend our feelings.”
—Arthur Miller (b. 1915)
“The almost unexplored Everglades lay close by and with a half- hour’s start a man who knew the country was safe from pursuit. As one man cheerfully confided ..., ‘A boat don’t leave no trail, stranger.’”
—For the State of Florida, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)