A Nice Guy Who Gets A Jolt Out Of Theater

At a glance, you can probably tell musical comedy veteran Jeff Heminger, 37, is often cast as the nice guy, the handsome leading man.

- Susan Lagsdin

In years hence, some local director will doubtless demand “get me a young Jeff Heminger” to fill those hard-to-cast parts.

That’s why he’s had such a good time playing bad guys: Dr. Neville Craven in The Secret Garden — he got to stage-slap a child! — and the gruff, overbearing, insensitive General Howell in Kiss Me Kate.

In his many roles on the Music Theatre of Wenatchee and Leavenworth Summer Theater stages, those are his only close encounters with evil. He looks like a guy you can trust.

You can. And that’s the quality — no acting involved — that he brings to his day job. As manager of the power operations for Douglas County P.U.D., the real time working of the hydroelectric grid, he’s the person who knows where every kilowatt is at every minute and constantly studies and updates myriad contingency plans.

Jeff sees connection between his work and his art.

“There’s always the math and music connection,” he said. “We know those patterns are similar. And I know the kind of problem-solving I do at the P.U.D. is related to creative stage work.”