Kristin Grant: Hello. We're very happy to be here. I am Kristin Grant. I am an Organizational Excellence Facilitator.

Jordan Grant: And I'm Jordan Grant. I am the Production Manager for the City of Farmington Civic Center, as well as Four Corners Musical Theater Company. We want to talk today about theater, live theater, and how it has connected our family over the course of Kristin and I knowing each other as well as going into the benefits of having our children involved in theater with us.

So, I'll start by talking a little bit about how Kristin and I met. I moved to the area when I was a freshman in high school. And I didn't know theater was a thing. I didn't know musical theater was a thing. And I got involved in one of the local high schools and my sister was a part of their theater program. And my father made her take me to rehearsal with her so that I could make friends.

Obviously, that is where I met Kristin, who was already involved in the theater program. They were in the middle of rehearsing for production. so I met my sister's friends, one of whom was Kristin. And eventually, the director put me in the show without my prompting or asking. He had a role that was open that he didn't cast, and he said, "Hey, this is yours now." I said, "That's great. Let's do it."

So, Kristin and I met in high school doing theater. We got to do one more show together the following year before Kristin graduated. So, we got to know each other over that year and a half, and we became good friends. So, we met in the theater program in high school. So, that is sort of how it started and it just sort of blossomed from there.

Kristin Grant: Yeah. So, like Jordan was saying, we knew each other also through his sister. So, I was friends with his sister. My best friend actually married his older brother as well. So, we were connected in lots of different ways, but we also continued doing theater together. As an adult, he was called back to the high school theater to play a role and I was called back to help do lights as well. So, we did that show and then we were actually asked to do Sandstone as well, the outdoor amphitheater professional program. And we continue to be in shows in that as well. We actually started dating at that time, took about 10 years for me to say yes to a date.

Jordan Grant: Ten long years.

Kristin Grant: And while we were doing our first show out at Sandstone, we started dating. And then, we got engaged, did two more shows. He went bald for one right before our wedding, which was a little nerve-wracking for me. I was really nervous about his hair growing back in time for the wedding. And we kind of just started our family from there. And since we've got young kids, we haven't been able to do as much theater, but we've been able to kind of get back into it a little bit to share this stuff with our family as well.

Jordan Grant: Yes, I was lucky enough to land a position here at the Civic Center at first working in the business office. So, I got a lot of experience working with contracts, doing a lot of customer service, working office administration and processes. I learned a lot about the contract process through that.

And eventually, in forming a relationship that's more of a mentor-mentoree-- I'm not sure if that's the right word, that's what I'm going to use-- relationship with the boss I have now. He began teaching me more about how those things apply to the theater side and about production work and getting shows together and how they come together and what you need to do to put them together.

So through that, I eventually became the production manager for these shows and other shows that we bring into the Civic Center that aren't produced in-house, but that we provide hospitality for. And so, through that, I got these opportunities to get back into musical theater. So, I was able to get back to one of my first loves, which has been fantastic. And I've gotten opportunities through that to be a part of teen and children's theater programs here. And I was lucky enough to get to be an Associate Director in one of our teen shows. And this was just a couple years back.

So, Jude was three and a half, going on four. So, I was able to bring him with me when we had rehearsals, or when we had to do a tech rehearsal or dress rehearsals. So, he was exposed to the production side alongside me as I was associate directing. And there are some rehearsals he'd just play on his tablet or watch videos and that's fine. But there were some where he was invested in what was going on in the process, and he was really interested in the blocking we were doing or watching the choreography for the number we were working on. And he got invested in that show and we went to almost every performance, and he wanted to come to every single one when they actually performed. So, that was a great stepping stone, not only for me to get back into musical theater, but to bring my firstborn, into the picture as well with me, and show him what I love doing. And he seemed to take a liking to it.

Kristin Grant: Yeah. And I think a big part of that too was that we didn't realize at such a young age we could kind of do some of this. I was home with our newborn daughter at that time, which was kind of like a necessity thing to take him to the rehearsals as well. Everybody loved him and they all started calling him the boss. Some of them still refer to him as the boss, which is really funny to me.

So, just being able to do theater with our kids. This year, we got the opportunity to direct and associate direct the Children's Theater Show. And in order to make that work, we obviously had to bring our kids with us because that's a basically every night commitment for a couple months. So, both of our kids, now five and almost three, were with us every single night. They got to help be there, cheer the other kids on that were performing in the show. It was a lot of fun because I'd catch my 2-year-old daughter singing the songs from the show as well when we were at home or when she was getting dressed or anything like that. So, that was a lot of fun seeing her do that or she'd get up as they were performing. And she'd dance with them in the audience. So, that was a lot of fun. We also want to talk a little bit about like the benefits of doing theater as a family and having this opportunity.

Jordan Grant: So, we're just going to go through a few things that we think have been a benefit to us and our family. Not only being involved in theater, but taking our kids to see live theater, to see things being performed in front of them. So, you know, kids get a ton of screen time these days. It's so beneficial to get them in front of something that's not prerecorded, something that's live that they can be involved in.

And I think one of the top things is just getting to share something that Kristin and I both have a passion for with our children, and hoping that we foster creativity in them through sharing that. So, that's one of the more important things to us.

Kristin Grant: Yeah. And I think kind of along those lines too, teaching them to be really good audience members and how to be in a live theater and interact with those individuals on stage and when to be loud so that you can support them and when to be quiet so that you can pay attention to the story and all of those things. It's been really good for them at this young age as well.

Jordan Grant: I think that's one of those things that helps us to teach them structure and timing. It's like this is a good time to be quiet, and this is a good time for us to be silly and loud. Another thing that we think is a benefit is getting to expose them to and enjoy creative art forms together. When you're talking about live theater, of course, our passion is musical theater. And we do expose them to a lot of that, which involves vocal performance, dance. It involves blocking acting.

But then, there are the creative art forms that we get a chance to expose our kids to that not a lot of people think about, which is the lighting. So, we pay attention to the lighting. We talk about when the fog machines come on. Our kids are exposed to mic checks and sound design. And those are elements that alongside the ones you see when the actors are performing, we talk about and expose them to offstage as well.

Not to mention the art forms, aside from just the musical theater, art forms that are performance pieces. You've also got things like puppetry. There's not a whole lot of poetry in the things we've seen and things like that, but there's spoken word in poetry. And as we progress as a family, we try to take opportunities as we see them, to expose them to things that maybe don't come through our town so often or things that we didn't produce in-house.

Kristin Grant: Yeah, and I think too with that, they get to see the creative side. I know Jordan does a lot of prop making for a lot of the shows and things like that. So, they get to see and be exposed to that. And I think it's especially been impactful for our son. He likes to create things now as well and just use his imagination in that way.

There's tons of studies about music being great developmentally for children. And so, to be able to expose them to those types of things has been great. I love to hear them sing, and just make music on their own because they're just so used to hearing and seeing those things in the things that we do and how we interact as a family.

Jordan Grant: Absolutely. And I touched on it a little bit, but just to drive the point home on this one, we get the unique opportunity not everyone gets. We get the unique opportunity in our position to get to expose our kids to the theater process and what goes into creating a show. So, they may have a deeper understanding of, "I'm not just watching something and taking in what I'm seeing." They understand that in order for us to get to the finished product. There are all these dominoes that have to fall in place first, which leads into our next point, which is one of the most important points.

Kristin Grant: Our kids get to be around very diverse groups of people, which has been amazing. We have actors coming in and out for some of these shows from all over the United States. They get to kind of see and be around those people. But I think also they get to experience that it's not just the actors on stage that make a show, it's also all of the tech people in the back. It's the people working behind the scenes, which I think is fantastic because when people think about theater or anything like that, it's really just the people you see in front of you that they think make the show, and it's so much more than that. And being able to appreciate what everybody puts into a show.

Jordan Grant: Our final point, which sort of caps off everything, and this is probably the most important piece, because it's the one that's not unique to our position. This is the one that translates to anybody, and everyone that gets their family involved in attending live performances and theater performances. And that's the quality time that you experience with your family.

A lot of people, they make a whole evening of it. You know, you buy tickets to a show, you buy tickets to see a performance. You go take your family out to dinner. You come to the show. And I think one of the most impactful things that we do after we take our kids to see something fun is that on the drive home we talk about what we saw. We ask them what they liked about it, what were your favorite parts of the performance we saw? Sometimes we leave and they say, "I didn't like that." And that's okay. That's part of it. Not everything is for everyone.

But if you don't think that live theater is for you and your family, but you've never given it a try, I would encourage you strongly to find something that even semi interests you, bring your family and just see how it goes. I can almost guarantee you're going to have a great time together. You're going to find something you enjoy, and you're going to spend that quality time together. You're going to have an experience that you had together that you can talk about after the fact. And you'll always have that. It'll be, "Remember when we went to this thing? Remember when we went and saw that concert? Remember when we saw this musical theater show and it was so cool and they had those puppets?" The theater just provides memories that are easy to hold onto because it's an experience you can't really find anywhere else. 

Kristin Grant: And I think it's cool too because especially live theater, it brings a special kind of magic because when you're watching something happen on stage, you're just asking yourself, "How did that even happen? How are they making this work?" which is really cool. And I think kids are captured by that kind of thing.

And I think we're really blessed in this area in this community to have opportunities to take our kids to these types of events and see and participate in these things. And that's also another really cool thing is that anyone can participate. There's a children's theater program, there's a teen voice program. There's opportunities for adults to participate locally in theater as well, which is really cool.

Jordan Grant: I think you hit on everything there. And the only thing I would add to that is that there are onstage opportunities, yes. But there are programs in our community that provide behind the scenes and backstage opportunities as well. If you're not interested in being on stage, but you think you or your children or somebody in your family might have an interest in backstage work. Stage managing, running spotlights, props, running crew, props, moving sets, lighting. There are opportunities for every facet of live theater for families to enjoy.

And there are classes offered to wide age ranges so that there are opportunities to take classes as a family even so. There are lots of theater opportunities in our community. And aside from the bottom line of it being a great thing for families to get involved in together, one of the bottom lines of our message would be if you have any interest at all, or even if you think you might, get yourself involved on some level, take your family to a show. Sign your family up for a class. It's a great thing to experience together and it'll only bring you guys together closer.

Kristin Grant: Definitely. And I think the fun thing too is that if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. But at least give it a try. You never know until you try it yourself. So, we just want to thank everybody for listening to our podcast today.

Jordan Grant: Yeah. Thank you so much for listening in.