After more than 40 years as an Evanston resident, as both student and professor of performance studies at Northwestern University, Frank Galati has sold his Evanston home in anticipation of his retirement from full-time teaching next August. What’s more, he’s had it with the Midwestern winters; he’s setting up a home in Florida. This proves that if you work in theatre long enough, you become Jewish. However, Dr. Galati will not completely abandon the Northern climes from which he hails. He also will maintain a downtown Chicago condo as he continues his affiliations with Northwestern and the Steppenwolf Theatre Company, directing and teaching at will.

A year later, in August 2007, the distinguished costume designer Virgil Johnson will retire after 22 years at Northwestern (preceded by nearly 20 years at the Goodman School of Drama and DePaul University). At Northwestern, Prof. Johnson headed the MFA programs in design and directing and later chaired the Theatre Department of the School of Speech. His emeritus status will offer him continued opportunities to teach if he wishes, and he also will continue his award-winning national career as a costume designer.

Friends of Michael Garcia are mourning his death in Detroit two weeks ago from cancer. Garcia appeared in several productions at the Boxer Rebellion Theatre, earning special kudos for his performance in Working, the musical adaptation of the book by Studs Terkel, who personally gave Garcia his enthusiastic approval. More recently, Garcia founded Searchlight Theatre, and worked with the International Theatre of Chicago (ITC) as an actor (Right! in 2003) and as a member of its advisory board. He moved to Detroit a year ago to be near his family as his illness worsened. Friends and colleagues held a celebration of life Nov. 6.

Spokespersons for both Boxer Rebellion and ITC described him as “a good man.” ITC founder Patrizia Acerra commented, “Michael was the person to go to if you wanted to talk shop. He had a great enthusiasm for the craft. He loved the events, the people, the ideas of theatre.”

This Michael Garcia is not to be confused with the Michael Garcia who is vice-president of the HealthWorks Theatre board of trustees. He’s still alive and well.

Kate McGovern, founding director of the Arts and Entertainment Management Project at The Athenaeum (AEMPA), departed recently from the program she initiated (with The Athenaeum’s Fred Solari) just last February. McGovern, who also taught entertainment law at DePaul University, reports that she and her law-professor husband, Peter, made a swift decision to move to Yankton, South Dakota, where she will head the Yankton Area Arts Association and he will develop a 100-year-old building into a cultural center. Their adult son, Sean, will open “a gallery-cum-bookstore.” Even by South Dakota standards, Yankton is small (under 13,000 in the 1990 census) but its setting is splendid, directly on the Missouri River on the Nebraska/South Dakota border. McGovern’s successor as AEMPA project director is Melissa Bareford, the former managing director of Lifeline Theatre.

The Tony Award-nominated musical A Year With Frog and Toad began life at a children’s theatre company and will have its Chicago regional premiere at a children’s theatre company, no matter that it played Broadway in between. The tuner by Robert and Willie Reale will be produced locally as the first production of the Chicago Children’s Theatre, the new group headed by Jacqueline Russell. The venue for the Jan. 14-March 5 run will be the Owen Theatre of the Goodman Theatre Center; an indication that Chicago Children’s Theatre hits the ground reasonably well-heeled. Goodman artistic associate Henry Godinez will direct, with choreography by Marla Lampert. A Year With Frog and Toad developed at the Children’s Theatre Company, St. Paul, MN and moved to Broadway in 2003, receiving three Tony Award nominations. Alas, that was the year of The Producers. The Chicago production definitely is being positioned as a family attraction. The eight-a-week performance schedule will include only two evening slots (Fridays, 6p.m. and Saturdays, 7p.m.).

The Neo-Futurists have promoted company member Sharon Greene to artistic director, succeeding Genevra Gallo, who has moved away from Chicago. Greene is a Northwestern grad who’s worked with Serendipity Theatre, About Face (where she’s a teaching artist for the About Face Youth Theatre) and for two years with the Neo-Futurists. She created Windmilled: Tilting at Don Quixote for the Neo-Futurists last year.

Molly McClinden began work in September as executive director of the Chicago Music and Dance Alliance (CDMA), serving a membership of more than 150 organizations. Next month, she’ll complete her Master’s degree in Integrated Marketing Communications at Roosevelt University. She comes to the CDMA from the Schaumberg Academy of Music, where she was both an instructor (she has a degree in vocal performance) and a marketing assistant.

No doubt Ms. McClinden will come to know Vesna Arsic, who recently joined the Joffrey Ballet as director of marketing. Ms. Arsic has 15 years of international experience, having worked with AT&T France, with Ameritech International, Sprint International and Chicago-based Motorola among others. She has degrees from Northern Illinois and Boston universities, and also has studied at the Sorbonne and Tufts University (my own alma mater).

The American Music Theatre Project (AMTP) at Northwestern University no doubt is hoping it has a potential Tony Award winner in its ranks. We don’t mean a show, but director Gary Griffin. The AMTP has announced that Griffin will stage the project’s second production, The Boys Are Coming Home, next August. Meanwhile, Griffin is making his Broadway debut with The Color Purple, now in previews in New York and scheduled for an early-December opening. If it’s a hit, Griffin is likely to be in the running for a directing Tony Award, to be handed out as always in June. The Boys Are Coming Home has a score by Leslie Arden, a book by Berni Stapleton from an idea by Timothy French, and is based on Much Ado About Nothing.

And so we bid you a fond goodnight. 

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