Year after year, the Green River High School Theater Department has put on strong plays and musicals and the new director can’t wait to jump into an already strong program.
During the recent Sweetwater County School District No. 2 board meeting, the trustees approved the request to hire Bradlee Skinner as its new theater director.
Skinner was teaching English at the Rock Springs High School for the past three years. Prior to that, he taught in Nevada and Utah. For the first 11 years of his teaching career, Skinner taught theater, then for the next four to five years he taught English.
Skinner has a master’s degree in English and a bachelor’s degree in theater with an acting and directing emphasis. He also have a license in administration educational leadership.
Skinner said the reason he pursued a master’s degree in English was to expand his career possibilities. He said if he would have just had a theater and communication degree he would have been either teaching theater or speech and debate. He wanted to be able to teach other areas and an English degree allowed him to do that.
“I decided to take a break from theater for a while because it’s a lot of work,” Skinner said.
In the past, when he was teaching theater it wasn’t unusual for him to get up before the sun rose to get to the school and stay after the sun set. After 11 years, he needed a break.
During his break from theater, he put his English degree to use. This break from theater also allowed him to coach tennis, track and field and lacrosse.
“It was something new, but my heart and passion has always been with theater,” Skinner said.
When he heard through the grapevine that the GRHS theater director position was open, he said it was an opportunity he just couldn’t pass up. He applied one day, had an interview the next day and was approved by the board about four days later. It was a fast process.
“It’s just exciting for me to come to a program that’s so successful,” Skinner said.
In the past, whenever he’s taken a theater director position, it’s always been a struggling program. He was then tasked with taking that struggling program and making it good.
Skinner said he is honored to have the opportunity to work with passionate students in a program that’s already strong.
Skinner isn’t intimidated at all by the success of the program and wants to continue making great plays and musicals that GRHS is known for.
“Before I became a teacher, I worked professional theater,” he said.
Skinner has worked for the professional Utah Shakespeare Festival in Cedar City, Utah. He’s proud to say that some of the students he taught have found successful careers in the technical aspect of theater.
Skinner is amazed at all of the features the GRHS theater has and can’t wait to use them. He’s been in the theater before and recalled his first time visiting the GRHS theater.
“Six years ago, I was sitting in the theater thinking about what I could do with it,” Skinner said. “Now, I’m there.”
When he was in the theater six years ago, he never imagined that his wish of working in such a great theater would actually come true.
Skinner has already requested the rights for all of the upcoming performances he would like to host this year and is waiting for approval. He already hopes to have a Halloween show, a one-night Christmas show, a March musical and a day to show off what they students are performing at the state showcase. He’s also hoping to have the Utah Shakespeare Festival come to Green River. None of this has been approved yet, but Skinner’s hoping it will be.
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