Today we’d like to introduce you to John Tessmer.
John, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
While I was born in the Midwest (my parents, Fran and Dave Tessmer, were from Evanston, Illinois), we moved here when I was in first grade, and from 2nd grade through 12th I went to La Jolla Country Day. I had many wonderful artistic experiences there, and one reason I chose to go east to Yale for college was in order to be able to continue to pursue them. I continued my interest in theatre there, in particular, and my English major afforded me the opportunity to study Shakespeare and Twentieth Century American drama especially.
After graduating, I came home to San Diego and worked in bookstores while auditioning and performing in town and soon thereafter getting hired by The Western Stage in Salinas, California… In the middle of my second season there, I decided to apply to graduate school and ended up being accepted by a 3-Year Professional Theatre Training Program and getting an M.F.A. in Acting from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee.
This was in the ’90s, and other than those three years in Milwaukee (great city, by the way!), I was on the road a lot, doing theatre in the summers in such places as Chatham, Massachusetts on Cape Cod at the Monomoy Theatre and the Idaho Rep in Moscow, ID and also working back in Southern California in San Diego, Los Angeles, and at the Laguna Playhouse…
From 1994-2001, I worked six of those eight years for the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, and half of those years I either taught acting for CSF’s “Camp Shakespeare” or the University of Colorado-Boulder. After a stint in New York, I returned home to San Diego for good (it would seem!) in 2001, and have been acting and directing ever since…!…
In addition to the above, I have performed with the Eugene O’Neill Foundation and Role Players Ensemble in Danville, California, as well as Carlsbad Playreaders, Grassroots Greeks, Intrepid Theatre Company, La Jolla Playhouse (WOW Festival: “The Car Plays”), Lamb’s Players, Mo’olelo Performing Arts Company, New Fortune Theatre Company, New Village Arts, North Coast Rep, the Playwrights Project, Poor Players, 6th@ Penn/Compass Theatre, Orchestra Nova, San Diego Ballet, and Scripps Ranch Theatre’s “Out On A Limb” New Play Festival (for the San Diego Int’l Fringe Festival).
I also was a founding member of the San Diego Shakespeare Society a decade and a half ago and now serve on its Board of Directors and as the Society’s Artistic Director.
Last summer at San Diego Writers Ink as part of the 2018 Fringe, I was in a play written by Michael Christopher Shantz and directed by Kristen Fogle; “The Quote,” a play about the press and the Gary Hart scandal, has since gone on to win a “Best Ensemble” honor at the Tuscon Fringe Festival earlier this year.
I recently directed Kim Cromwell’s one-woman show, “Abelia,” as part of the La Jolla Theatre Ensemble’s Solo Series, and appeared in Tom Steward’s “The Moonraker Affair” as part of “Bond On Draper” – to open up the LJTE’s 2019 Season. And in mid-March, at the City Heights Performing Annex (Tuesday, March 19th, 7pm) and the La Jolla Community Center (Wednesday, March 20th, 7pm), in conjunction with Tanika Baptiste Productions, the LJTE will co-produce Ntozake Shange’s brilliant prose-poem play, “for colored girls who have considered suicide/when the rainbow is enuf,” in conjunction with Women’s History Month and SWAN Day, Supporting Women Artists Now.
Great, so let’s dig a little deeper into the story – has it been an easy path overall and if not, what were the challenges you’ve had to overcome?
“The course of true love never did run smooth.” — That is a quote from Shakespeare’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and while it was written with respect to relationships, it applies to not only my love for acting and the theatre, but I imagine for nearly all artists and the pursuit of their passion.
Early in the life of an artist for a younger man or woman, there are often times of self-doubt and insecurity, and hopefully, we are able to fight through those and not only come out stronger but learn more about ourselves and the human condition along the way…
These experiences (which of course can apply to people of any age) can enable an actor to understand more facets of his or her fellow human beings — which fosters a greater ability to get inside the heads and hearts of characters to be played as well asincreased compassion in general.
I decided to pursue a career as an actor not only to be able (cut the repeat of these three words: thank you!) to have the opportunity to play challenging roles in great plays but because I felt it would make me a better person. But even if that is true, that hardly means having the career I have chosen has been easy.
The search for work can be invigorating; I actually, fortunately –still(!), after all these years– enjoy auditioning. But it can also be unrelenting. Having to make decisions about one’s life path more often than many has an upside of one being able to enjoy a fairly high degree of freedom, but a downside of a unique kind of stress or anxiety.
Growing accustomed to it all helps, but there are different things to get used to with respect to the “lifestyle” at different points in life.
Please tell us about La Jolla Theatre Ensemble.
With Davida Huchel, I co-founded the La Jolla Theatre Ensemble (LJTE) in 2010. Since then we have produced more than 75 staged readings. We have 2-4 (or two to four) rehearsals and then present a play to an audience for a pair of performances.
The actors have their scripts in hand, and we stage the productions minimally; when things are really humming, the audience can get caught up in the play the same way it would if it were a full production, and I often have audience members express that they forget the actors are on script.
That’s because we are able to get some of the finest actors in town (and sometimes from l.A.) to join us. We do classic plays by Ibsen, Chekhov, Shaw, Arthur Miller, Clifford Odets, and Tennessee Williams, contemporary plays, and plays by local playwrights.
I currently serve as the company’s Producing Artistic Director. We largely perform at the La Jolla Community Center and the La Jolla Library, but we have also performed downtown and at St. James by-the-Sea Episcopal Church in La Jolla and The Bishop’s School; and I am working on a partnership with my high school alma mater, La Jolla Country Day School.
Do you look back particularly fondly on any memories from childhood?
Oh, my… I have many good memories from growing up.
I have lots of good memories of playing with kids in the neighborhood and, of course, from my time at La Jolla Country Day, singing in the Glee Club and the Madrigal Group, acting in the plays and musicals, and playing on sports teams, especially basketball.
I remember fondly reading lots of wonderful plays and books as a boy and “young man” in the summer; and before going back to school, we had a family tradition of vacationing for a couple of weeks in Lake Tahoe…
Now, one of my sisters lives up there, and I still try to get up there once a year to see her and her family and experience the peace and the beauty of the Lake and its surroundings.
Pricing:
- Attendance at La Jolla Theatre Ensemble Staged Reading Performances is Usually by a $10 Suggested Donation; ALL Contributions are Welcome!
Contact Info:
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