COVER STORY .

Kevin Glaccum

Producing artistic director / Bartender / Standardized patient


	print	email	reply	rss feed

Published: Aug 19, 2009

Neal Santos

Kevin Glaccum has three gigs, and each informs the others.

Glaccum is a veteran behind the bar at Woody's, the landmark gay bar where he's served up killer martinis since 1987. Twenty-two years and many decent paychecks later, Glaccum is still a familiar face behind the bar every Wednesday and Saturday (although he used to serve drinks considerably more frequently). Over the years, Glaccum's amassed a slew of tales told only to a favorite bartender after a couple of stiff drinks.

"I worked with this guy once ... "

"I have this regular who ... "

With his warm, welcoming smile and sonorous laugh that can fill up a room, Glaccum refers to the bar industry as "the golden handcuffs" — his schedule is flexible and the money's consistently good, even during a recession. That certainly can't be said about an artistic outfit such as Azuka Theatre, where Glaccum is producing artistic director. It wasn't until a mini-midlife crisis around 1999 that he went back into theater. "It was about not wondering, as opposed to never tried," Glaccum says.

Despite his love of performance, Glaccum spends his time at Azuka behind the scenes — he picks the shows, raises money, directs the plays. He gets out his acting bug as a standardized medical patient at the University of Pennsylvania. He's one of those guys who acts out symptoms so medical students can learn the intangibilities of being a doctor — how to diagnose, how to council, how to comfort. At the end of a session, he gives the docs-in-training feedback. In a way, he's directing them, too.

It's directing, not acting, that is now Glaccum's passion. "It's a better fit. And I have control issues, I'll totally cop to that," he says with that grand, contagious laugh. "I love putting it all together."

The Long Christmas Ride Home kicks off Azuka Theatre's 10th anniversary season starting Oct. 29, Mandell Theater, Drexel University, 3300 Chestnut St., 215-733-0255, azukatheatre.org.