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St. Olaf theater's Gisselman to direct Guthrie's Christmas Carol

By Carole Leigh Engblom
August 5, 2002

St. Olaf Theater Artistic Director Gary Gisselman will again direct Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. The 2001 production of this holiday classic, directed for the first time by Gisselman, enjoyed its most acclaimed reviews in its 27-year history.

Gary Gisselman
St. Olaf Theater Artistic Director Gary Gisselman will once again direct the Guthrie's Christmas Carol.
Gisselman will balance a full teaching schedule at St. Olaf College with his Christmas Carol directing duties, scheduling classes in the morning and Guthrie rehearsals in the afternoon and evening. "It is stressful, but the directing has a tendency to nourish the teaching and the teaching the directing," Gisselman says. "Years ago a fine director and head of the Yale drama school, Lloyd Richards, told me that the secret of being involved with many things was 'to be where you are.' So, when I am at St. Olaf, I try to be there, and when I'm at the Guthrie, I'm there."

The Guthrie is an important resource for St. Olaf, Gisselman says, given that it's an internationally known theater only 40 miles away. He wants St. Olaf, in turn, to be a good resource for the Guthrie. Gisselman will involve his theater students in this year's Christmas Carol production. His directing class will attend some rehearsals, and his Introduction to Theatre class will attend a preview and meet the production's cast and crew.

St. Olaf communication-theater majors also will work directly with the director. Sarah Rasmussen '01 will be Gisselman's directing assistant, Brian Kennedy '02 will be the production's intern director and Arianne Sandford '02, currently a Guthrie intern, will be assigned to the Christmas Carol staff. This summer, St. Olaf English major Andy Pezalla '03 worked in the Guthrie's company development program.

Gisselman, a well-known figure in the Twin Cities theater community, has directed more than 200 productions of plays, musicals, industrial films and operas. He is the founding artistic director of Chanhassen Dinner Theaters and a former artistic director of the Children's Theater Company in Minneapolis. He has been artistic director for the St. Olaf College Theatre since 1999. Gisselman also has taught at the University of Minnesota School of Music, the University of Arizona and Arizona State University.

At St. Olaf, Gisselman teaches Introduction to Directing, Introduction to Theatre, Advanced Directing, Acting for Majors and Non-majors, topics classes in musical theater and Developing an Artistic Point of View. During the summer of 2002 he co-led, with St. Olaf Professor of Theater Patrick Quade, the Shaw and Shakespeare theater festival Study Travel program in Ontario, Canada. In January 2003, Gisselman will lead the Theatre in London Interim, and next April he is slated to direct the St. Olaf Theatre's spring musical.

Contact David Gonnerman at 507-786-3315 or gonnermd@stolaf.edu.