Faculty Profile
Owen Schaub
Owen Schaub knew he'd caught the "theatre bug" when as a Long
Island teenager he couldn't wait until school resumed because he
missed working in the theatre. "It began one day when I offered to
help a friend carry some lighting equipment and someone asked me to
continue helping and I did - for the next three years," he says. As
he prepared to enter his senior year he realized how much he missed
building scenery and setting lights. "I started bugging the theatre
teacher about when we could begin our first production. That's when
it I realized how important it was to me."
So important that more than 40 years later he is still eager for
school to resume each fall so he can return to his work in theatre
and as a professor in Butler Theatre. "I wouldn't want to do
anything else. Being a teacher of an art form is a marvelous life -
it is the opportunity to create as an artist and work with other
people who share those goals," says Schaub. "I'm well-suited to
teaching college theatre and I think I knew that early on. I know
that I am lucky to have the opportunity to do it."
Schaub never performed on stage, preferring to focus his talents
on the design and technical aspects of theatre. His experience
includes work at the University of Hawaii, Dalhousie University in
Canada and Newberry College in South Carolina, but it is Butler
where he's been the past 24 years. He joined Butler as an associate
professor and department chairman, where he served until 1987 and
as acting chair from 1989 to 1997. Under his leadership the
department grew in both faculty and enrollment and became more
specialized. With enrollment at 76 this year, it is about twice its
1980 figure. In 1987, Schaub was able to turn over some technical
duties to staff positions and begin directing main stage
productions, and since 1998 he has concentrated solely on
directing. "The productions became more elaborate and we had more
people to design and develop them, so I turned my attention toward
directing."
His hope for Butler students? "That they will have some sense
that theatre art is important to them in whatever kind of career or
future they choose, and they take what they have learned - working
well with others, discipline and a good work ethic - with them.
Most importantly, that they are happy adults," says Schaub, with an
affirmation that confirms he has found that level of happiness in
the theatre.