Queer Voices
Queer Voices
October 29th - Jeffrey Campbell of Allies in Hope, Danielle Sampey of Lazarus House, and Second Chance Players
On this episode of QUEER VOICES, Deborah Moncrief Bell talks with Jeffrey Campbell, who is the CEO of ALLIES IN HOPE (formerly AIDS FOUNDATION HOUSTON). He talks about all things related to the organization and tells us about their upcoming Ball, which is scheduled for November 14th. You can find tickets at https://www.aihhouston.org/hopeforhoustonball
Danielle Sampey talks with Bryan Hlavinka about Lazarus House. This organization provides fitness and diet programs for individuals with a chronic condition that causes wasting. Their website can be found at https://thelazarushouse.org/
Then Joel Tatum talks to the 2ND CHANCE PLAYERS OF DALLAS, TX. They are about to open a production of THE LARAMIE PROJECT. You can find out more about them at https://www.secondchanceplayers.org/
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SPEAKER_00:Welcome to this week's Queer Voices Radio Show and Podcast. We are Houston's voice for the LGBTQIA Plus community. We've been here for over five decades on KPFT. We have three segments for you. Up first, Deborah Moncrief Bell is going to interview Jeffrey Campbell. He runs Allies in Hope, which is an organization that was formerly known as AIDS Foundation Houston. Then Brian Lovinka will speak with Danielle Sampi of The Lazarus House, a group that helps to rehabilitate through exercise and nutrition. And finally, we end with Joel Tatum talking to Second Chance Players of Dallas, a unique theater group that offers theater as therapy and as recovery. So Queer Voices starts now.
SPEAKER_06:Jeffrey Campbell is the chief executive officer of Allies and Hope. And Jeffrey, are we at the point where we no longer have to qualify formally the AIDS Foundation?
SPEAKER_05:You know, Deb, that is such a great question. No, we are not. And I still like to say it, not just to ring people's bells about who we are, but to pay homage to individuals that started this organization and did such great work over the years before we became allies in Hope and May of 2023.
SPEAKER_06:And you've been for two decades now involved in the HIV AIDS community, uh, working with programs and helping people. And I think I remember you saying that there's this concept that there's no longer an epidemic where AIDS is concerned, but there is.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, Dub, there is this concept that the epidemic has gone away, that there are no new diagnoses, that this is something that we do not have to be concerned about any longer. And that is very far from the truth. We do still have new diagnoses on a daily basis. Here in Houston Harris County, we have about 1,200 new diagnoses for HIV a year. And also here in Houston Harris County, one or two of the challenges that we have is when it comes to viral suppression, which is what makes a person living with HIV not able to transmit the virus to someone else through sex. We're not hitting that ending the HIV epidemic marker when it comes to Houston-Harris County. We're also not hitting the marker when it comes to the number of pre-people that are engaging PrEP, which is a pre-exposure prophylaxis that prevents the contraction of HIV. So we have a lot of work to do here in Houston.
SPEAKER_06:Yeah, I think the good news is that it's not necessarily a death sentence as it once was in the early days, but there's so much to be concerned about. And the fact that that mentality of that it's not a problem anymore is in fact the problem because people are not paying attention. They're not necessarily engaging in safe sex practice. They're they're they're not getting on prep. They're not they're they're not informed. Uh we we we still have so much education to do. So Allies in Hope is engaged in providing education. What are some of the other things the organization does?
SPEAKER_05:You know, I always like to talk about our housing programs uh because housing is healthcare. And I do think that we can say that about housing, not just strictly related to HIV, but to diabetes, to lupus, to cancer. Individuals who are experiencing chronic health issues that have housing security, they do better with their health conditions. But this is really true for persons living with HIV. When you have a safe place to store your medication, when you have just, it does so much for your mental health and mental well-being. When you know you have a place to go home to, when a doctor or someone at a clinic asks you for information about an address, you're giving them an address that really does exist. It is the roof over your head. So we do housing. We still have Stone Soup. Stone Soup is still in existence. And Stone Soup is in two locations now. It's here at our Midtown location, here on Fannon, and it's also at our Southwest location on West Park. And we do not just make food available to persons living with HIV. It is anyone that is experiencing some type of food insecurity.
SPEAKER_06:That's interesting to know. And it has become quite the issue because food prices have gone up so much. And sometimes people, they don't necessarily count on it for their whole grocery uh needs, but it supplements what they're able to get. And it provides nutrition, which is part of the battle in being healthy, is making sure you have good nutrition. So that is really good. How do people come to allies in hope? I guess you call them clients, and uh uh what's the entryway?
SPEAKER_05:The people who come to us for services, some are called clients, and that's mostly those individuals who come in for prevention work, uh, also individuals that are in our housing programs and individuals who come in for stone soup food services. Those folks who come into our clinic for prep and in PEP and for rapid start art, they come in and they are called patients because they are part of our clinic. And they they come into us a couple of ways. Uh, some of them come in through coordinated access for housing services. So we are with the coalition for the homeless, we are a coordinated access hub. So individuals can come here and provide information about their housing status or the state of being unhoused. And they won't necessarily be housed by us. The coalition makes that decision, but we take that information and it goes to the coalition to help that person have placement sooner than later. Other individuals they hear about us on the website. They see our website, they can make appointments for their clinic appointments and for their prevention appointments through our website. You go on the website, you click on the appointment calendar, you make an appointment, and somebody from us reaches back out to you to help you navigate to make sure you've uh checked the right appointment, check the right appointment time, and you're getting what you need. And other ways I think that are important for us to mention, uh, we have a mobile clinic, our mobile unit. And that mobile unit is out in the community three to five times a week. So many individuals, they may never come to our brick and mortar location, but they'll come and receive services related to sexual health and well-being at our mobile clinic wherever we may be in the community. Sometimes we're out there at events, or there are other times when uh the health department, we partner with the health department, and the health department says, Hey, we need you in this zip code at this intersection because there's a rise in the number of, and it could be any one of the sexually transmitted infections, and we'll go out there and we'll be there, and that's where people can encounter us as well.
SPEAKER_06:One of the things uh that people need to know is there's no judgment. They are welcomed, they are helped, they're provided with the information or whatever it is that they need in order to be as healthy as they can be. So, Jeffrey, as we know, so many organizations are really in a difficult time right now because there's been so many funding cuts. And what ways does Allies in Hope get funding?
SPEAKER_05:Okay, so that's a great question. We receive monies from the federal government that comes directly to us. We also receive monies from the federal government that goes through our city. So our whether it's for housing or if it's for HIV prevention. And then we also receive funding from foundations, and they could be foundations that are an arm of a pharmaceutical company. They could be foundations that are family-run foundations where someone in the family has left specific directives about how they want their money to be used after they're no longer here. And then we also get a significant amount of dollars from individual contributors. And that's very important for individuals. I appreciate it. And, you know, just a quick story. Yesterday, I had lunch with an individual who I saw was a routine monthly individual contributor. Could not figure out how he was connected to the organization. Had lunch with him along with one of our uh great board members, Chris Lewis. And at that lunch, he shared that many years ago he had been part of our camp hope for children impacted by HIV. He wasn't living with HIV, but he had a parent who was. And as an adult, he wanted to find a way to give back to a community that had helped him. And he was able to find Camp Hope. And so it was because of that experience that he had almost 20 years ago that he has become a consistent, ongoing, monthly donor to this organization. So the work that individuals do with us in giving, it makes a tremendous difference.
SPEAKER_06:Often it is those um personal connections to something where someone's not directly impacted, but they have someone, a friend or a family member, and it's an a way to honor them and uh to uh be part of, you know, Houston was built on philanthropy. Uh and that's a really wonderful thing. You know, you just look around and you kind of go, oh, this this was made possible because somebody cared enough to do it. Uh and and I guess that's all we're asking for is care enough to do something. Um, but you also have an event coming up. Tell me about the uh Hope for Houston ball.
SPEAKER_05:Yes, the Hope for Houston Ball. This is our third Hope for Houston Ball. It's coming up Friday evening, November 14th. We'll be at the Revere, which is a wonderful venue. We were there last year. It's at 7 p.m. And our theme is Casino Royale. So a little bit of a James Bond fun but fancy dressed uh event with some wonderful food. We are honoring this year. We have three honorees. The Shelby Hodge Vision Award is going to the U.S. Business Action to end HIV for the work that this organization is doing uh right now in three cities: Houston, Los Angeles, and Atlanta, to engage corporate America, to bring them to the table, to have conversations, to determine what are the best ways for corporate America to show up to end the HIV epidemic. Then we are also honoring with our Ada Edwards Humanitarian Award, the Greater Houston LGBTQ Chamber of Commerce, uh led by co-founder and CEO Tammy Wallace. We're honoring the change of chamber because they are partnered with the U.S. Business Action to end HIV as the umbrella of the work that we're doing here in Houston with corporate America and the ending the HIV campaign. And then finally, we're also honoring with the Ada Edwards Humanitarian Award, State Senator Boris Miles. Some years ago, Senator Miles was a Texas representative. He had an idea to take hip-hop and merge hip-hop with HIV prevention. And he came to the then leaders of AIDS Foundation Houston, and that's why it's important for me to continue to say it, and said, Hey, what can we do to provide testing to the young adult community across Houston and then partner with uh the radio station to issue tickets for a hip hop concert? The leaders of Allies and Hope or AIDS Foundation Houston at that time, they joined in with the City of Houston Health Department and so many other uh HIV prevention service organizations to launch hip hop for HIV, which was now State Senator Miles' vision. It was his baby. And over the next 10 years, we've tested over 50,000 people in the Houston area, and they knew what their HIV status was. And then a part of that was a big hip-hop concert where rap and hip hop artists came together, they promoted prevention, they promoted safer sex, they promoted sexual wellness. It was fabulous. And several cities across the nation now have taken that um that basic footprint and done similar concerts and testing campaigns in their cities. So we're honoring State Senator Boris Miles with the Ada Edwards Humanitarian Award because of his vision that became reality for us.
SPEAKER_06:There you go. We were talking earlier about how the arts can have an impact, and that certainly was an innovative way to bring artistic creative talent into the battle against HIV and AIDS. Once again, we're talking with Jeffrey Campbell, uh C the CEO of Allies in Hope, about the Hope for Houston ball. And give me the details on that again and the website address where people can find out more information.
SPEAKER_05:Sure. So the Hope for Houston Ball, hosted by Allies and Hope, formerly AIDS Foundation Houston, is coming up Friday, November 14th at 7 p.m. at the Revere. Wanna share with you that our co-chairs are Dr. Joseph Gath and his lovely wife, Deanna BroGath, as well as Michael Broadwick and Brian Hull. That event is really our um, it's our big event for the year, and we're excited about it. The theme is Casino Royale, and you can go to a IHHouston.org forward slash hope for Houston Ball. That's AIH Houston.org forward slash hope for Houston Ball to get information about the event, purchase tickets, tables, and sponsorships.
SPEAKER_06:Jeffrey, is there anything else that you would like to say that we didn't already discuss?
SPEAKER_05:You know, thank you, Deb, for that question. I I think we are just we want to talk about the work that we do every day here uh to achieve our mission of ending the HIV epidemic in the Greater Houston area. We're really close. Uh we've got a lot of work to do, but we're very close. And it is important, and thank you for bringing it up, that people know that HIV is still an issue. It is a human issue. It's not attached to any one community. And so, with that, we all have to do our very best to be informed, to pass on information that is accurate, to engage in our own sexual health and wellness, engage our medical doctors, go to a clinic on an annual basis, if nothing else, to be tested and know that Allies and Hope is here for you. We are your friend, we are a stigma-free environment. And uh, that is one thing that I believe is most important in getting to the end is eliminating the stigma. And that's one of the things we work very hard to do.
SPEAKER_06:Well, thank you for being with us on Queer Voices. I'm Deborah Moncrees Bell. Hey, Brian, do you know what time it is?
SPEAKER_02:It's podcasting time.
SPEAKER_06:It's Pledge Drive at KPFT. And it's time to ask our listeners to please support the station. And there's several ways they can do that. One of the best ways is to go to KPFT.org and click the donate button, and then you have to go through a little scroll-down menu to select queer voices as the program that you're supporting. But we hope that you support all the great programs on KPFT. I give a monthly pledge, and you can do it as a one-time donation or set up a regular schedule. And sometimes you get great premiums, so you can check that out on the website as well. I know you also donate.
SPEAKER_02:I do. Uh I give$40 a month to KPFT, which adds up over time. So I like donating to something that I believe in and that's important for the community.
SPEAKER_06:And you know, we're getting a lot of attention lately. First of all, congratulations to you and Ethan Michelle Gance on your selections as gayest and greatest for the Out Smart poll. And moi as well in my category, which is female community radio. And yours was male. We didn't get a podcast this time, but that's okay because we're a radio show and a podcast. Yes, we were a finalist. We were just talking earlier about it. Seems like everybody and their dog has a podcast now, but we hope that people will continue to listen to Queer Voices and support the station and listen to us online when they're not able to listen to it on Wednesday night.
SPEAKER_02:Very good. And I'd like to point out that we have a new website that we're developing uh coming soon to queervoices.org.
SPEAKER_06:It's up now, but we need to do some tweaking. So pay no attention to the parts that are gibberish, but we're excited about that and about bringing more wonderful content. Lee and Brett are bringing wonderful stuff. Davis is bringing wonderful stuff, and Joel and Ethan, when they have the opportunity, we are always looking for other people to become involved. You don't have to have radio experience. Did you have any radio experience before you started?
SPEAKER_02:Or just listening to it in the middle of the night.
SPEAKER_06:Oh, listening to it in the middle of the night. Well, I'm so glad that you did and that it inspired you in part to embrace yourself as a gay man and your coming out process. And then being interested in activism and realizing that doing radio was a form of activism. So you've been at it a while, and I've been at it a while, but I didn't have any broadcast experience. I just Jack Belinsky invited me to come and be on the show, and we kind of took off from there. I too was just a listener and then I volunteered at KPFT for several programs during Pledge Drive. And then was a guest at different times. And that's how I got into it. So, you know, we'll we'll train you. The station provides technical training, and then it's just kind of you can learn it on the job, so to speak. So anyone who has an interest in that, just contact me, Deborah at queervoices.org or Brian at queervoices.org. Oh, queervoices.org. How wonderful. Well, I want to thank everyone who is a listener and especially all of you who are supporters. We really appreciate you and we hope that you tune in on a regular basis and also that you uh contribute on a regular basis. It's community radio right here in Houston, Texas.
SPEAKER_02:This is Brian Lavinka, and I'm joined today by Danielle Sampei from Lazarus House. Welcome to the show, Danielle.
SPEAKER_07:Thank you, Brian. I'm happy to be here.
SPEAKER_02:So, for people that don't know, what is Lazarus House?
SPEAKER_07:Lazarus House is a nonprofit organization that helps adults and adolescents with chronic illness where muscle loss may be a col one of the collateral devastating issues associated with chronic illness. What we do is we provide a program that helps strengthen people while they go through their treatments for their illness or their condition. And uh what we do is we help people not just live longer but live stronger lives.
SPEAKER_02:So is it mostly through diet and exercise, or how do you do that exactly?
SPEAKER_07:Diet is a big part of it, and exercise is a huge component of it. But we also try to take a holistic approach to it where we do things that help elevate the spirit as well. So it's like 33% of each one of those diet, um, exercise, and then uh your well-being emotionally and spiritually and mentally.
SPEAKER_02:So, how long have you been involved and how did they find you?
SPEAKER_07:I don't know who found who. Uh, Lazarus House has been around since 2002. I'm one of the founding members of it. The way it came about was in the late 90s, uh, I was working at a medical clinic, uh physical therapy clinic that was uh providing an exercise program for people with HIV. And in the 90s, physicians were asking patients with HIV to conserve their energy because they thought it expedited the wasting. Um this clinic was run by someone who had a great idea and was on point with the outcome of being careful about how you apply the stimuli of a workload to someone who has an an illness, but do apply it, just modify it. And so this exercise program was uh spectacular and it did really well in the physical therapy setting. We saw many people who were very wasted actually regain muscle. And uh it was it was wonderful. I just loved that job. It was it was outstanding. Maybe three years into it. Um, and I started out as a trainer there, and then I moved up as a director there, and uh three years into it, uh, that's when healthcare started changing, how long they would um provide allowable services for physical therapy. So it was limited but to a certain number. We were working a minimum of 12 weeks with these patients, and and that was cut. And so that clinic ended up closing when that happened. My staff and I, we all went in different directions, but our the patients had become very good friends of ours. And one of them called me and told me that he was having problems. And I told him that I wasn't a physical therapist and that I couldn't help him. I wasn't a doctor. He said, I know you're doing some personal training on the side, and I said, I was, and it was at an upscale gym that was fairly exclusive, and he said, I need your help and I can't pay you. This guy was a dear friend of mine, he'd become a very good friend of mine, and so I was willing, if he kept it quiet, I was gonna train him and I would train him for free. And that's what I did. And I told him, Don't tell anybody. He was having a problem walking. I knew his wife, I knew his daughter. He couldn't drive his wife to work anymore, he couldn't drive his daughter to school. And uh, so I was willing to help him. And um he's a good guy. And maybe a month into it, he went from a wheelchair back to walking again on a walker. And uh his name was Reggie, and Reggie went and told everybody, all of our past patients. Yeah. And uh so I started my phone started ringing and ringing, and uh, I I just reached out to some of our past staff and I said, at the clinic, and I said, This is what's going on, but nobody can pay us. What can we do? And so everybody started offering their services for free, which was wonderful, but you can only sustain that for so long. And uh that's kind of how we just started trying to figure out how do we put it together. We're not doing a clinical setting. None of us are clinicians, we're not physical therapists, we're not providing treatment, we're providing an exercise program. Everybody should be exercising, but if you have certain illnesses, you absolutely need to be exercising. And uh, you want to do it safely, so you want to be under the direction of someone you trust, someone who has experience. The team was willing to work for free for a period of time. Everybody worked for free for quite a while, and eventually we became uh a nonprofit. Well, we were all all along a nonprofit, but uh that's just how we created Lazarus Us to make it sustainable, and we made it a lower no-cost program for our clients.
SPEAKER_02:I bet you have some good stories from clients that you've had.
SPEAKER_07:Oh my goodness, I have wonderful ones and I have some that are just gut-wrenching, you know, because you see both sides of the coin. We've seen much more good than bad, but uh from the nineties, um you know, that was a that was a hard time in the eighties and nineties, uh working with um people that you really they they put a lot of energy into it and you wanted the best and and you become very intimately close with people and to lose anybody was um it made me want to work harder and try harder. And uh you never let go of that person in your heart.
SPEAKER_02:I don't know how we ever got through that time.
SPEAKER_07:Isn't it true? Isn't it true? Because if you just pause for a moment, like every December 1st, we write on the board everybody we remember. I can find myself standing there for hours. How did we do it? I I don't know.
SPEAKER_02:I have friends that quit counting after they lost 150 people.
SPEAKER_07:My God.
SPEAKER_02:I'm like, that's crazy.
SPEAKER_07:It is, it is, and there's a whole new generation that just not aware. No, not at all. And not that I want people to have to go through that, but it can leave a mark to help you always remember and make changes and yeah, live your best life.
SPEAKER_02:That's right. That's so I'm part of an organization called EPA, Executive Professional Association of Houston, and we recently held a fundraiser for Lazarus House. So I was gonna ask you how that went on your side and what is that money gonna be used for?
SPEAKER_07:Oh gosh, we are so, so grateful to you guys. Y'all did a phenomenal job, and uh you raised a wonderful amount of funds that we are actually uh using to um build out one of our bathrooms and make it completely ADA accessible, and it's gonna have a roll-in shower. Everything's just gonna look phenomenal. The house itself is was built in 1911, so it was a part of the original McGregor homes. The bones of the house are fabulous, but if you can imagine the bathrooms were added in later on, like in the 30s and 40s, and uh antiquated, and we've updated bits and pieces as we can, but now I'll just have to. Any photos because we are taking lots of photos and videos for EPA as we document it, but we've gutted it out, and uh, and there's quite a bit of space. I'm so happy about it, and we're completely and I mean from the bones forward, it's gonna be all brand new, completely accessible and comfortable. We want it to be inviting and comfortable. That's a big part about Lazarus. I you know, when you go to work out in the gym, it's kind of like walking up to something you might hesitate for a second. We want you to feel good and walk right in. So it's a home, but as you walk in, it's a functional gym, and the same thing in the bathrooms. We want you to feel good and comfortable and like you're you're at your own home where you feel good to be at.
SPEAKER_02:Now, where is Lazarus House for our listeners who may not know?
SPEAKER_07:Our address is 4106 Austin Street. So we're in midtown, and we are almost sandwiched between HCC and the new Rice Ion. So we're we're we're right in that area. We're close to Wheeler. Cleburne and Wheeler are our two um end streets for us on Austin.
SPEAKER_02:So kind of Gaborhood adjacent.
SPEAKER_07:Yes, yes, yes. We're we're located in a very convenient position. That we wouldn't know why we ended up there. You know, we got that house because it was in the um 2001, 2002. The market was still coming back around, and we were just looking for a place to lease so that we can uh put the the organization into something, and that was all we could afford, and it was a different neighborhood then. Uh we we met everybody all around us, including the the people who um lived on the on the streets and under the um the 59 overpass there and uh became good friends with a lot of people, but that the area has really gone through a lot of development, and there's only a few uh of the homes that used to be by us that still stand now in big four-story and three-story town homes, and then the ion is literally um two blocks from our backyard.
SPEAKER_02:Yeah, they're they're putting some money in there. Now, is there anything that I didn't ask you that you want our listeners to know about Lazarus House?
SPEAKER_07:I just want people to know that we are here and we're here to help. So if you know anybody who has any kind of diagnosis like HIV or stroke, spinal cord injury, MS, any kind of long-term uh challenge in their health where muscle loss can be one of those um devastating, devastating side effects, we're here to help. We're here to help people uh be strong. A lot of times, insurance, it you have that gap of treatment, and life or can help you in between that, uh, stay strong. So we're here and we want to provide as much uh help as we can to our community.
SPEAKER_02:Now, uh, do you need volunteers? I'm sure you do.
SPEAKER_07:We always need volunteers, yeah.
SPEAKER_02:How can people get in touch with you to become a volunteer?
SPEAKER_07:They can call me uh directly. It's at Lazarus House 713 526 5071. You can ask for me or Douglas Springfield. He's a program director right now.
SPEAKER_02:And do you have a website?
SPEAKER_07:We do. It's thhelazarushouse.org. So T H E L A Z A R U S H O U S E R dot O R G.
SPEAKER_02:Well, I've been speaking with Danielle Sampi from the Lazarus House, and uh, thank you for coming on.
SPEAKER_07:It's been my pleasure. Thank you, Brian. I appreciate you.
SPEAKER_09:Hello, everyone. I'm Joel Tatum, and you're listening to Queer Voices. There's a little theater group in Dallas, Texas that's tackling not only inclusivity, but recovery as well. And I want to welcome them to the show. Second chance players, welcome Bill Shea, managing director, and Caleb Ross, assistant director, board member, and actor and performer.
SPEAKER_11:Hey, thanks. Glad that you're here. Glad to be here.
SPEAKER_09:So I want to get into the recovery aspect of what you guys do. How did that get started? Why is that an important aspect of your theater?
SPEAKER_11:Well, it is the uh founding principle of second chance players. Uh, the way we got to be was that uh, well, first of all, I'm in recovery. I have uh 35 years of continuous sobriety in uh AA. And um in Dallas here, we have a recovery conference every year in May, which is uh sponsored by the local gay AA group. Um it's called the Big Diggy Roundup. And about 15 years ago, um, I was approached to do uh musical as the entertainment for the convention. And what I would do is take some popular songs and rewrite them with with recovery lyrics and uh do a little one act play about some kind of recovery concept, and uh it got to be pretty popular. And what I discovered was there were a lot of people that were in recovery that loved to do theater and had a lot of talent, but for uh for whatever reason had stopped performing. And and I was one of those people, quite frankly. I hadn't done anything in 20, 25 years. I I did a lot of theater up in New York in my 20s and 30s after I moved down to Dallas. I just let it go by the wayside. Uh couple of reasons for that. Theater is a uh trigger for a lot of people. I did a lot of partying while I was doing my shows and uh just felt like I had other things to do. But when I started doing these little musicals, uh the juices started flowing, and uh we had plenty of people that were interested in doing more. So I organized a um our first board of directors, which had a musical director and a costume designer, and uh and a lot of the work that was done behind the scenes uh we were able to fill. And I said, well, why don't we just do a uh uh a community theater um for people who want to do theater but don't know how or don't know how to get back involved in it, and uh and that's what we did. And uh then the COVID happened and kind of delayed us for a while, and uh after that we uh we went full hog and uh became a 501c3, started our first production with the story of the origin story of AA called Bill W and Dr. Bob, which was a off-Broadway show that had been performed a lot around the country. It was a huge success. We wanted to do a straight play and a musical. Our next musical was Next to Normal, which was a heavy lift, frankly. Uh, probably if I knew how hard it was gonna be to do, I might have waited a little bit after I had shaken off the rust. But uh, you know, once you once you're in, you're in. And uh and that's actually where I met Caleb. Caleb was uh was working for another theater group, and we ran into each other while I was touring the theater, and he asked me what we were doing, and I said, next to normal. And uh he said, Oh, that's one of my favorite shows, and I want to do gabe. And and then we lost touch, and I was looking for a gabe when I was casting, and I said, Where was that kid that I met up in Frisco that day? So totally different way of finding each other. I had put the word out, and he had been doing a uh a little nightclub performance where the musical director had been somebody I had reached out to, and they told him about second chance players, and we were doing next to normal. And we hooked up and uh I said, Did I meet you once? And we talked about this. And he said, he said, yeah. And I was like, Okay, well, send me something. And he sent me a TikTok audition, and uh, it was perfect. I knew he was perfect for the role, and I cast him and uh and we became friends, co-workers, and uh I really appreciated his dedication to what we were trying to do and his knowledge of all aspects of theater. And what we want to do is we want to provide a theater that not only welcomes people in, but lets them do the things that they want to do. So it's like, what are you good at? What do you want to do? And Caleb is very good at technical, and he was uh he was very interested in um the the the the technical side of it, the lights, the sound, all the things that I really don't want to do. And uh so I asked him to be on the board. And then he was the one, and I'm gonna let him kind of tell this story. He was the one that suggested the Laramie project because he had done a few um um couple of papers on it in high school, and uh I had not thought of it, and uh, I was kind of disappointed in myself that I had not thought of it because it's exactly in line with our mission statement. And uh I'll I'll let Caleb take it over for me here.
SPEAKER_08:So, as far as Laramie Project, it holds a really special place in my heart. My family, my mother actually just corrected me yesterday. Apparently, I've been telling this story wrong. Um, but whenever I was about 12 years old, I came out of the closet to my family. And uh the story I've been telling is that the next day I had some friends that were in the Laramie Project, and so I took my mom to go see the Laramie Project. Um, but apparently that is not true. I came out to my mom, and that night she spent the whole night on social media and Facebook, and she saw an ad for the Laramie Project, and she was actually the one that bought the tickets and insisted that we go see the Laramie Project as a family. So now remembering that, that just holds an even dearer place in my heart that my mom took the time to be like, like, this is really an important thing. Let's have this bonding moment together. Following that, all through high school, anytime I got the chance to write a research paper on some sort of historical element, I always chose to write about the Laramie Project because even today it shocks me how many people aren't aware of the story or only knows fragments and only knows the name, but doesn't know the actual history and how that plays into today's politics and laws, lawmaking.
SPEAKER_09:Let's let's talk a little about your experience as an actor. Um, how do you bring your experience as an actor to the board?
SPEAKER_08:A majority of my life I spent on the theater side, and whether that be in youth theater or adult theater, I have a lot more experience there than I would on the other side of the table at this point in my life. And so because of that, I feel like it brings a fun element of like, well, this works, this doesn't work from the actor standpoint, which I think makes the rehearsal room flow a little bit more easily. Having that experience is a lot more fun whenever you're able to be like, oh, well, I remember this. I remember what works and what doesn't, and I can really connect with the actors rather than there being some sort of power dynamic that's kind of weird of, oh, well, they're the director and we're just the actors. Like, nah, we're all we're all friends. And and that goes back to what Bill was saying about what we're trying to build here with second chance players, that it really is a community. There's a place for everybody. If you don't want to really be in front of the curtain and you want to be more behind the scenes, we got the space for you.
SPEAKER_09:How do you tackle such big emotional roles with people who are themselves going through trauma and that kind of thing? How do you how do you get such performances out of these actors?
SPEAKER_11:That is something that informs every actor. Uh one of the things that we found out, a lot of the a lot of the people that um um uh auditioned for the Laramie Project knew about it and wanted to do it. And, you know, and if they didn't know know about it, they researched it and they found out what it was about. So they came into it knowing that this was heavy material and were, you know, uh had a desire to um to do it. Um we have we have one actress that she has never been uh on stage before um in a straight play. She's she's done a lot of um uh kind of um how would you describe Winter's experience, Caleb?
SPEAKER_08:She has a lot of educational experience. She's worked in schools and she's taken classes, uh, but as far as on-stage experience, uh limited in the community and professional theater sense, but she's stellar.
SPEAKER_11:And she has turned out to be someone who we got very lucky with. And she is an amazing, an amazing actor, and uh we're we're lucky to have her. So I think everybody's got a different story as to why they want to do a uh uh an emotionally challenging role. But um, I think as an actor, you uh you you welcome the challenge because it does can use that trauma to inform your performance.
SPEAKER_08:And there's definitely danger whenever it comes to using your own personal experience. There's always the complications of it getting too intense. You wrap up your own personal life with the character's life, but I think you walk that fine line of using your own personal experience and drawing from your own personal experience to tell a beautiful story that is oftentimes so important. I think there's no better use of sometimes your own personal trauma to help tell art and beautiful stories.
SPEAKER_09:Because I can imagine, and now I actually I didn't know if this was appropriate, uh, but I actually thought of it as hurt people playing, learning how to play to hurt people.
SPEAKER_08:Oftentimes actors will find coping mechanisms through their characters. Sometimes they'll find problems that they haven't even come to terms with themselves in their characters, and then through learning with the characters, they're able to heal altogether. They're able to figure out their own ways of coping and healing. Like theater is therapy through and through.
SPEAKER_09:We talked a little about the acting uh perspective, running a theater. Let's talk about the management aspect, the business part. How Caleb, how different is it looking at looking at how to run a theater trip from the other side?
SPEAKER_08:Well, I'm I'm new, I'm only just freshly joining, and I'm more on the marketing side. So that's been the most interesting thing for me is I always see whenever I do a show, their Facebook post will post a little marketing reel or something, and I'll be like, oh, that was cute, that's cool, but that's never really been pertaining to me. I would share it, but it was never something I would worry about. And boy, have I been worried about it in this last month and a half. I've every waking moment, I've been trying to figure out new marketing ideas, new interview videos that we could do with our cast. Uh, we we recently we went to the Dallas Pride Parade and we marched in the Pride Parade uh for the first time. That was super, super awesome and super cool. But it was a lot of planning to figure out how to get there and how to make it work as a group. Um, so from that side of things, it's been it's been so much fun, so educational, but it's been interesting to learn. Bill has been doing more of the business side of things, though, for sure.
SPEAKER_09:Bill, let's let's talk a little bit about the business side. Um, how is it? How do you manage to run a troop as well as, you know, you're you're still a director, you're still an actor. Tell us about give us a little bit about the day-to-day goings-on behind the scenes of how you do uh how you get shows together, how you found venues, how you uh find sponsors, that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_11:Well, that's a great question. Um, when we started out, I didn't know any of that. And uh I just uh you know said, well, you know, other people do it. I certainly can. And when we needed a venue, I just googled, you know, theater spaces in Dallas and uh I started calling around and I found a place to do. This was when we were doing Bill W and Dr. Bob, and I found a place that we could afford and uh was close enough to Dallas where we could still talk about being a DFW uh uh theater theater group. And uh then I just had then I was about raising money. And uh we we did our first show basically on friends and family, and mostly my friends and family. Um I put out letters and and I got donations from people that were never going to come see the show. A lot of people from New York, a lot of people that I knew in the past, you know, everything from five dollars to five hundred dollars to, you know, a thousand dollars because people believed in what we were doing, and people knew me and and they were confident that I was doing something important. And uh so that's how we started. And you know, I realized that that was not a way to build a theater, that that it was a good start. And so I started looking for people, good people that wanted to uh be part of it, that it was a collaborative effort. And um we uh uh actually one of my first cast members was uh in marketing as a profession. I asked her to be on the board to do to do our marketing, and she's been terrific. She works with Caleb now on getting our social media out and our fundraising letters out. Um, I found somebody from my DALC league who is interested in doing fundraising. So I turned that over to him, and he's on the board now. So my whole life has been about start something. If it's supposed to happen, the doors will open for you. And that's been really the stories of second chance players. Uh, we're right now in a fundraising uh mode. We have we're buying, we want to buy our equipment because uh it's a big expense to rent lights and sound for every uh every um performance, and uh and we're having some success with it. So the business side of it is really about money. It costs money to do theater. So you want to do things that people want to see. Uh, ticket sales are a big part of that, and you want to stay true to your mission, which is why we're doing things like the Laramie Project and Bill and Bob, and and some of our shows that we're looking at for next season are uh LGBTQ plus centered and also have a story to tell about discovery and about growth and about you know overcoming trauma, but we also want to entertain, you know, so uh uh you can't do that alone. So you have to have good people around you. And I'm I'm I'm fond of saying that I I finally have the board that I want. I have people that are committed, like uh, like Caleb and our our uh gentleman I mentioned, Josh and Leah and uh David, who does our costuming. He used to, you know, that's what he used to do for a living. He made clothes. And so he's he's real involved. He's 79 years old and he's willing to move sets around and do whatever you whatever we ask. So people who are theater people, you know, don't just act. They paint sets, they get, you know, do costuming, they do marketing. That's the story of community theater. So if you if if you think you can do it by yourself, you're gonna fail. Um, you have to have people that are willing to work with you, and you have to be willing to work with them. Uh, I'm having a wonderful time. I've I've never had an assistant director as involved with the with the production um than Caleb, and I have come to trust him implicitly. I let him do a lot of things that I don't let a lot of other people do. And uh and I'm excited about that because it can't be all about, you know, what I do. It has I don't want to direct every show that we do. And uh you have to bring people up. And I think that's what theater can do. It can it can give people the opportunity to do what makes them feel feel like they are uh part of the theater community, and that's what I want second chance players to be about.
SPEAKER_09:Speaking of uh the Laramie Project, uh Caleb, let's let's get you back in here. This is uh you're you're tackling a big project and putting it on a small stage. Um what's the work that's gonna go into making sure that you give the drama of the show on a smaller stage?
SPEAKER_08:So I love that question, first of all. Um so whenever I was 15 years old, I begged my mom, begged my mom, begged my mom to take me into New York City and see a bunch of Broadway shows. And one of the only shows that I cared about seeing was Fun Home. Uh and Fun Home was performed in Circle on the Square Theater, which is right next to the Gershwin. It's this tiny little, it's the only theater on Broadway that's in the round. And it seats maybe 550 people, maybe 600. Like it's a very small theater. You're never more than 10 rows back. It's so intimate. And a show like Fun Home requires that. I saw it whenever it came on tour and they had it in the big proscenium. The show's amazing, it's beautiful, but it just doesn't hit the same as it does in a small, intimate proscenium or a small intimate round theater. So whenever I approached Bill with the idea of doing the Laramie Project, it was immediately in my mind. I was like, we have to do this in the round. I I just think a show like the Laramie Project, especially a show that's set up the way the Laramie Project is, where it's kind of documentary style, it's not so much um one thing after the other. Uh it it just lends itself to being more of a group effort and including the audience in that group just makes it so it flows beautifully. There's so much heart in the story, and without the separation of that fourth wall, it it leaves everyone unguarded a little bit, which you kind of have to be for a story like this.
SPEAKER_11:And I might add that as I said, my trust in Caleb, I've never done any theater on the ground. So I said, we can do this, but uh um you need to sell me on it. How are we going to do it? And uh and once we were agreed that this was uh something that uh we could accomplish um that informed our decision to do it in a church uh uh which will lend itself to that intimacy. We're only gonna have a hundred seats in the audience. That's that's all we need, you know. Uh and it will be it will be a totally immersive experience.
SPEAKER_09:Uh let's uh let's promote dates. Let's promote where this is gonna be before we lose time because we I we could talk about this for hours. I can talk to you guys about this for hours. Literally can. So tell us uh what the dates are up for the show and where it's gonna be.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, so we're performing the second, the third, and the fourth weekends of November. So that's the weekend of the sixth, the weekend of the 14th, and the weekend of the 20th. Um, all of our dates are also on our website at secondchanceplayers.org. Uh, and it's gonna be performed at the Horizons Unitarian Universalist Church in Carrollton, which, if you know anything about the story of Matthew Shepard, the Universalist Church or the Unitarian Church, and sorry, I rather, uh, the Unitarian Church plays a large role in the story. And so it is so great partnership that we have with this church, and we're so excited to be able to partner with them to tell this story.
SPEAKER_11:We're also doing collaborations with the human rights campaign, the resource center here in Dallas, uh, Turtle Creek Corral, and the Big D D Roundup, the aforementioned Big D Roundup. So we get to promote other organizations at the same time as telling the story of Matthew Shepherd, which absolutely needs to be told. This is the 25th uh anniversary of the first performance, and right this week is the 27th anniversary of Matthew Shepherd being tied to a buck fence and left to die in Laramie, Wyoming.
SPEAKER_09:No, uh we're we're almost at the end of the episode. Houston and Dallas, we always have this fun little rivalry back and forth. But how do you want Houstonians to uh perceive second uh second chance players?
SPEAKER_08:No, it's all a community, it's all a big family, and especially here in Texas, so we gotta stick together. So I think I think that's a big takeaway too with second chance players, is we're we're trying to be uh something and someplace like Texas needs it. And we're happy to be here.
SPEAKER_09:Thank you. Thank you guys for being on the show. Uh let's uh make sure everybody gets all their socials out so that you know if people want to reach out and reach out to you in any way, shape, or form. Get all your socials out for me, guys.
SPEAKER_08:Yeah, we're second chance players on all socials except for Instagram. On Instagram, we're second chance players theater, and for some weird reason it's theater with an E R, not an R E. Uh That's how it's spelled in English.
SPEAKER_10:I actually spelled it with an R E. Exactly. It's an R-E, right? I actually spelled it. It's an R E. When I was writing my adult, I spelled it with an R E in old English.
SPEAKER_09:Yes. Yeah. Because I think the E R is for movies. So okay, that's fine.
SPEAKER_11:That's fine. We'll we'll let that we'll let that out. We'll let that slide.
SPEAKER_09:Guys and second chance players for the case.
SPEAKER_11:I'll tell you, if I have an opportunity, one one last thing, one last connection I have to this. Uh uh, I was I was and continue to be to this day, friends with the co-author of uh the Laramie Project, Lee Fonda Kowski. And she is going to be uh she can come in for it, but she's going to be part of you know helping the cast. We're gonna do a zoom, we're gonna do a couple of Zoom meetings with the cast. She's gonna tell us her experience in doing it 25 years ago, and we're very excited to have her support.
SPEAKER_09:Thank you, second chance players, for being on Queer Voices. Thank you so much.
SPEAKER_04:This has been Queer Voices, heard on KPFT Houston and as a podcast available from several podcasting sources. Check our web page queervoices.org for more information.
