​I never thought I would make a great researcher. In point of fact, I occasionally need to turn to my daughter for pointers. She once chased down a lead from San Francisco all the way to Coos Bay, Oregon.
But I do have to admit that working on this project has been fun. There are a lot of official dates, openings, performances, and other details that need to be verified. Once that work is completed, those facts can be folded into the final edits.
Currently, I’m verifying information through Redding’s hometown newspaper, The Record Searchlight. The dates you see above are dates confirmed by articles the paper has provided me.But to be accurate, I still need to dig deeper.
It turns out I have never been microfiching before. Ah, the glow of the reflected light as you scroll through day after day of old news stories. It does give you a remarkable reminder of what was happening in the country, and in the county, during that particular span of time.
And, like real fishing, sometimes you have to throw a lead back because it’s just too small.
All part of the sport.
Very relaxing, microfiching. It’s like real fishing, except you do it in the dark, you’re all alone in a library, and the guy next to you is breathing heavily as he scrolls through old copies of Playboy magazine.
Some dates are going to have to be verified by more than one source. One thing I’ve learned from the people I’ve talked to already is that none of us are perfect. Not one of us remembers every relevant date from nearly fifty years ago.
Memory is funny that way. But I do promise you this.
When One Summer is finally published, every date mentioned in its pages will have been verified by at least three witnesses, two historians, a lawyer, a judge, a jury, a notary public, the surviving members of the Warren Commission, and several hundred people living within a 100-mile radius of Redding.
And if that still isn’t good enough for you, I really don’t know what will be.

Thanks for coming back. I’m afraid we’re now at the grueling part of the memoir, wending our way toward the finish line. Once this draft is completed, I’ll turn seriously to the interviews with other participants.
Currently, I’m polishing Chapter 20, appropriately titled “Shenanigans,” which concerns what happens when a company of actors suddenly has too much free time. Lately, I wouldn’t know much about that. The closer I get to the end of this volume, the less time I seem to have to get into trouble.
I don’t know. Maybe that’s a good thing.
Oh, another vital part of the book that is still unfolding is the actual festival schedule. What played, when it played, and at what time.
Thanks to some due diligence yesterday, we’re now about halfway through reconstructing the dates and showtimes for all three plays. Now, this may not sound like a big deal, but keep in mind, nearly fifty years have passed. Pinpointing those dates and times helps establish the who, what, where, and why of the memoir.
What surprised me is how difficult it has been to reconstruct something as basic as the festival schedule. You would think dates and showtimes would be the easy part.
They aren’t. Programs disappear. Newspaper archives are incomplete. Memory starts playing tricks. One person remembers Hair on a Friday, another swears it was Saturday. So every date I can verify becomes another little stake in the ground.
I’m still actively recruiting interviews for the final section of the book and will let you know how that all turns out. I’m also hoping to head up to Redding in the very near future to see whether the Shasta College archive team has uncovered anything interesting.
One recently rediscovered bit of trivia is that comedian David Steinberg performed during the summer festival as a special guest artist. Back in the sixties and seventies, Steinberg was a frequent guest on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour and later had a television show of his own. His comic persona often involved mock lectures delivered with a dry, slightly Groucho Marx kind of flair.
I have no idea how much money his appearance raised, but it was nice to discover that our little summer festival had at least one genuine celebrity attached to it.
That’s where things stand for now.
Still writing. Still digging. And, apparently, still finding surprises.

What I did not expect was meeting a new friend, protector, and bedmate.
For the life of me, I did not think the two of us would grow so close in such a brief time. Michael, I expected to bond at once. His dog Tahoe turned out to be a very unexpected benefit.
To say Tahoe is a happy dog is putting it mildly. He is handsome, playful, athletic, and very affectionate. I may just have to come back down soon to interview him.
Upon arriving, Michael and I chatted until the wee hours of the night, just laying the groundwork for our interview that would take place on Wednesday. As the two humans bonded, Tahoe was always there, sitting beside me, resting his head in my lap, and reminding me that he was there as well. And that he was available for an interview anytime.
It was after Michael and I said goodnight that Tahoe really got serious about bonding.
The room was dark. I was settling into a very comfortable bed when—umph!—a large presence made itself known by leaping onto the bed. This uninvited friend wasted no time beginning his canine seduction. The licking of my bare feet quickly settled into spooning as Michael’s dog curled up against his new best friend.
The evening was not entirely peaceful. There was a canine dream during which Tahoe apparently decided to use my back as a treadmill in pursuit of whatever the squirrel that had been tormenting him. I am sure he left a couple of marks, which I will have to explain to my wife later.
Despite the spooning, he was the perfect gentleman, and after the third night, when he decided to sleep on the floor next to the bed, left me a little disappointed. Oh, well.
Sensing that I was feeling a bit abandoned, during the last hour of the last day of my stay he jumped into bed and reminded me, ever so cruelly, of what I would be missing after I was gone.
As I sit in the airport writing this, I am already missing my new friend and protector. Goodbye, Tahoe. Until we meet again.

     The following is the finished prologue to my new memoir, One Summer. If you've been wondering what the book is about, this should give you an idea.
     The 60-page book proposal has now been completed, and my agent has begun sending it to  publishers to gauge interest. Next week I'll be flying to Los Angeles to sit down with one of my fellow cast members, Michael Kamenir, for an interview. I hope to conduct several more conversations with members of the 1977 company as the book moves toward completion.
     On the surface, One Summer is about the extraordinary journey I took in 1977. But more than that, it's about something we all share—the one season, the one place, the one chapter of our lives that never really leaves us.
     I hope you enjoy this small sample.
 
 
     I had taken this exit countless times over the years. Exit 299. Head east a few miles, turn left onto Old Oregon Highway, and follow the familiar road to Shasta College.
     Long after the summer of 1977 had become a memory, I still found myself making this detour whenever I was driving between Portland and Los Angeles. Most of the time I came alone, wandering the quiet campus and remembering the people who had once filled it with life. Once, I even convinced my wife and reluctant teenage daughter to come along for an impromptu tour.
To them, it was simply another college campus. To me, it was so much more. 
     But this visit was different. This time I wasn't content to simply walk the grounds. I wanted to go inside.
     I parked, stretched my legs, and walked toward the familiar glass building that now served as the entrance to the theater complex. I rattled the glass doors. Locked. I cupped my hands against the glass and peered into the darkened lobby. Nothing.
     Undeterred, I wandered around the side of the building until I noticed activity inside one of the offices. A man stepped through the doorway, and I introduced myself, explaining that I had performed here decades earlier and wondered if it might be possible to take a quick look around.
     He smiled knowingly. “Of course.”
     A few moments later, I found myself walking through the familiar red lobby toward the double doors leading into the theater.
     It hadn't changed in thirty years. The honey-colored wood walls still framed the auditorium, the rows of red cushioned seats, now slightly broken in by three decades of audiences, climbing the gentle incline to the back of house. The blue curtain stood open, and a lone ghost light cast its quiet circle across the mostly bare stage, illuminating the stage where one summer had become a lifetime of stories.
     The sight stopped me cold. It wasn't the actors. It wasn't the skeletal framing of a half-completed set. It wasn't even the theater. It was the sudden realization that part of me had never really left this place. I quietly slipped into the back row and sat down.
     Onstage, actors rehearsed a play I didn't recognize. They never noticed me. They were too immersed in their work. I heard the rhythmic hammering of flats being fastened into place, smelled the unmistakable scent of fresh paint, and listened to the familiar scurrying overhead as technicians adjusted the lights. Somewhere backstage someone laughed. A stage manager called out a note.
     It was the third week of June. Shasta College was preparing for yet another summer theater season.
     Suddenly, I wasn't watching someone else's rehearsal. I was watching my own life.
     Nearly thirty years earlier, I had been one of those young actors, standing beneath the work lights, running lines, learning choreography, wondering whether I belonged there, convinced that the rest of my life was just beginning.
     The years between then and now quietly disappeared. For a few moments, it wasn't thirty years ago. It was yesterday. I closed my eyes. Memories that had lived quietly in the darkness for decades began stepping back into the light. Faces appeared first. Then voices. Then laughter.
Soon I could smell the familiar scent of pancake makeup, hear the orchestra warming up, feel the nervous excitement before the curtain rose, and remember the impossible certainty that comes only with youth—that somehow the future would unfold exactly as I imagined it.
     When I opened my eyes, I realized these memories deserved more than quiet visits to an empty theater. They deserved to be remembered.
     It would take another twenty years before I found the courage to write them down.
     Every performer has one summer they never forget. Mine was 1977.
     Most people have never heard of the Shasta College Summer Festival. It really existed for only two summers, tucked between its larger cousin, the Summer Repertory Theater in Santa Rosa, California, and the Tony Award Winning Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland, Oregon. Yet for one remarkable moment in time, it became home to an extraordinary collection of actors, directors, musicians, designers, dreamers... and a few unforgettable characters.
     That summer I was hired as part of a twenty-person professional company. The smaller roles and chorus were filled by Shasta College students and members of the local community. The season included Hair, Man of La Mancha, The Hot l Baltimore, and a children's production.
Under the direction of Artistic Director Cecil O. Johnson and Festival Producer Craig Thompson, we lived three theatrical lives at once. We rehearsed one show during the day, performed another that evening, then started all over again the next morning. Somewhere between costume changes, opening nights, work detail, cast parties, and too little sleep, friendships were formed.
     Like most theatrical companies, it accumulated its share of stories. Some were true. Others grew a little taller each time they were told. The truth, as it turned out, was even stranger.
     Before the summer was over there would be forest fires, impossible romances, backstage disasters, unforgettable performances, friendships we thought would last a lifetime... and one heartbreaking goodbye that would echo through the next fifty years of my life.
     Some of us would go on to careers in show business. Others would leave it behind entirely. A few are no longer with us.
     Summer stock is a little like a traveling circus. People arrive from different corners of the country, share an intense few months together, then scatter again, often never expecting to meet a second time.
     Nearly fifty years later, I still think about that summer—and the remarkable people who shared it with me. It was chaotic. It was exhilarating. It was occasionally hilarious, sometimes heartbreaking, and almost always unforgettable.
     This is how I remember it.