September 2012

Artistic Director
Sean K. Thompson

A new season, a new beginning. Season 12 of UpStage Theatre is behind us; Season 13 begins.

In July, Artistic Directors Arnold and Ann Richie announced their retirement from the theatre they began in 2000. For a dozen years, they were responsible for creating and maintaining Houston’s family friendly theatre oasis, and for bringing it to our current home of Lambert Hall in the Heights in 2007. They succeeded on an admirable scale with their presentations year after year of classics, audience favorites, new stagings, and popular musicals. As we closed our 12th season with record-setting audiences for our Festival of Comedy, “going dark” took on a whole new meaning as the lights came down and we bid a sad farewell to our co-founders, friends, and mentors.

However, the show must go on, and the lights are coming up on a whole new season. There are recognizable faces and fresh ones, new directions and familiar territories. Though we’re changing and growing, the UpStage Theatre you have known is still there. New? Yes and no. Improved? Always. We’re not a new theatre now, but we’re more than the old. We like to think of this season as the introduction of UpStage 2.0.

I am honored to have been “groomed” by Arnold and Ann and appointed by the Board of Directors to assume the role of Artistic Director of UpStage Theatre. It’s my privilege to continue to bring exciting productions that the entire family can come enjoy, and my job to inspire audiences to come back again and again. This is a job that I take dear to heart.

UpStage is our home. The door is open. Why not come in and sit for a spell? Have we got some stories to show you…!

Sean K. Thompson
Artistic Director