Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Michael Beverley. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.

Michael, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. Are you happy as a creative professional? Do you sometimes wonder what it would be like to work for someone else?

Well I don’t think being an artist is a choice I think it’s who you are. An artist has an intense desire to create, or to investigate the world through story telling.. When we are not doing this we feel a sense that something is missing. I am at my happiest in the studio creating and collaborating with fellow artists, I’m primarily talking as a theatre artist since that is my medium, but the idea of “quitting” doesn’t really exist to me.

In the United States we put this big emphasis on “making it.” That unless you are making the big bucks and fully funding your life through your artistic pursuits then you are a failure. I believe this way of thinking is more toxic for artists than helpful and, in my case, caused a lot of stress. I felt if I were working a day job then I was failing— whatever that means — and I avoided it for a long time. Unfortunately I live in the United States where we don’t place great significance on the arts and humanities the way people do in other countries. This may mean you make money as an artist, but not a lot of it.

I avoided getting a day job for the first five years of my career, and recently got my first full time day job. I work as a special education assistant, mostly working with students around kindergarten age. This job actually made me a better, if not much more tired, artist. I’ve become a better communicator and a more empathetic person. I think to be a good artist you have to have a point of view and the only way to have a point of view is to truly live in the world. Being an educator has really helped my artistic practice in that I work with people and engage with the world around me. It’s given me a lot of perspective that I explore through my work as a director.

Michael, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I primarily work as a theatre director and educator with concentrations in ensemble creation, new play development, queer history and physical theatre practices.

I sort of fell into theatre. I needed a fine arts credit in college and was convinced by my roommate Marshall Bailey —who now works in the Baltimore area as a puppeteer, actor and props designer—to take an Intro to Acting class with him. I fell in love with it immediately and was lucky to have teachers who showed me that being an artist is a true career path. My professors in college eventually realized— before I did— that I was a much better director than an actor. My directing mentor, Matt Saltzberg, sat me in his office and said “Michael Beverley, you are a better director than actor, you should be pursuing what you are good at.” At first I was angry. I thought my mentor just told me I was a terrible artist, but as I get older I realize just how right he was. I’ve found a lot of joy in the work I’ve created with my colleagues and my perspective as a director is unique in the industry.

Over the course of my career I developed my directing style. A highly collaborative highly physical way of looking at the creation of work. Many theatrical directors just tell actors where to stand and how to say their lines. This makes for poor theatre, instead we in the rehearsal room are working as a collective. As the director, I bring my original vision to the table, but I then function as a sort of artist/facilitator. I take in the perspectives of the room and ask the leading questions to get us to where we need to go. This makes for fully realized productions where every artist involved feels they had a hand in the creation of the piece. I’m the most proud of my work with actors when they tell me how creatively fulfilling working with me is.

After college I hit the ground running and immediately began auditioning and applying to be a director. I got a lot of “no thank you” as you do in this industry. I became frustrated. I felt I was being gatekept due to my age. Rather than wallowing in my own misery I said “screw it” and made my own theatre. I co-founded The Shore Ensemble (https://www.instagram.com/the_shore_ensemble/) a collective of theatre artists based in Maryland dedicated to empathetic and physical story telling. Founding my own company not only allowed me to produce the type of plays I wanted to make, but allowed me to serve my community. I primarily work in an arts desert with very little access to professional theatre.

I also work as a college professor when I can. I was lucky to have teachers who saw my talent and helped to cultivate it. I want to do that for other students so that I can help them move forward in their own artistic journeys.

In your view, what can society to do to best support artists, creatives and a thriving creative ecosystem?

Leave your homes. Put down your phone and go see a play. Get your friends together and go walk through the art gallery at the local college. Go to that local museum you always drive past. You do not need to travel to see the arts; you need to support the arts that are in your backyard. A healthy arts community is important for a society to thrive. We become more empathetic, better communicators, and a thriving arts community means that the people who live in the community are engaging with each other.

Plus artists get paid, which means they get to live to create another day. And thus, the cycle continues.

To business owners, or people with spaces, let the artists in. Let your business, your empty space, become a hub for the local arts community. Host a poetry reading, commission a local artist for a mural, sponsor a play.

A creative ecosystem is a living ecosystem. To keep it alive you have to engage with it.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

I think it’s impossible as an artist to ignore the rise in popularity of generative artificial intelligence. A.I. is the latest step in technology continuing to isolate us on our own individual islands. It is why I’m not very interested in film, or creating content for the internet. The screen is meant to keep you from engaging with another human being.

My mission as an artist is to bring people together. There is something to be said about laughing, or crying, or cheering in a room full of strangers. It’s how we learn to respect, connect and maybe even love one another.

It’s why I love the theatre. The only way to make theatre is to be in a room together. We work, and sweat, and get frustrated, and laugh, and talk about the script for hours. We then present our work to an audience and grapple with the ideas presented in the script as a group, both performer and spectator, and we grow as people. I think that idea is at the center of everything I do as an artist.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.michaelbeverley.net
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/the_shore_ensemble/

Image Credits

Michael Beverley

Ryan Brennecke