Gary hesse

LST stage veteran treasures the teamwork and relishes the rich variety of roles

- SUSAN LAGSDIN

“Just say the lines and don’t trip over the furniture.” That’s good advice from playwright Noel Coward for an actor agonizing a little too much about motivation.

But successful actors rarely stop there. Leavenworth Summer Theater actor Gary Hesse has played significant supporting roles 605 times in 49 different shows.

And even after playing The Sound of Music’s charming villain Max Detweiler in 228 performances, he still looks for nuance in this character part. In fact, he might take issue (politely) with the broad-stroke descriptors “charming” and “villain.”

“Max has learned to use that charm to his advantage; every relationship he has serves him in some way, he ‘goes along to get along’,” posited Gary in an interview about his acting life.

And villainy? [SPOILER ALERT] “Some directors place Max offstage at the end when the Von Trapps exit to their escape; others want the audience to think that he’s risked all and orchestrated it himself. He’s probably the most complex character in the play.”

He‘s awed by the power of theater to “turn pieces of paper into an experience that causes audiences to laugh or cry or think… without a net, stitching it all together in a month with people who are just getting to know each other.”

And it’s this last factor that keeps him auditioning and acting every year: working many shows with new cast members and possibly new directors and, he describes, “creating the palpable sense of community created by each show’s cast.”

Gary considers bringing people together (“Especially when we are so divided as a nation,” he adds) to be the central organizing principle of his life.