I'm very convinced that being hit in the head by a baseball bat when I was six years old

propelled me into the theater.

Bartlett Shear, the Tony Award winning theater director, isn't being tongue in cheek here. He's not making some joke

about how nuts you have to be to go into theater. No, he means it literally.

Just because it put me in this very different place, it put me outside of the regular kids.

I had to go through a couple of brain surgeries to sort of clear out all the bone chips in my brain.

I think it sort of reshaped my way of seeing things. Then later when I was in sixth grade,

so a bit older, I broke my leg, my femur, and I spent three months in the hospital.

And while I was in the hospital, you know, just in traction, I was perfectly fine.

I did all kinds of crazy adventurous things that were unusual.

So I always felt, and I think theater people in general, are a little bit

outsiders and I always felt a little bit on the edge and a little bit on the outside. So those

kind of experiences were quite formative to me and they did lead me to be interested

in expressive experiences and perspectives and I was always very questioning and very both sensitive and questioning at the same time.

Risk taking also?

Risk taking, yeah, I mean as a kid I did all kinds of crazy sports and did all that stuff.

So, yeah, I don't, I like risk.

I'm not like a, I don't like, I don't seek danger.

I don't get a thrill out of risk.

I'm just unafraid of risk. You know, I don't think there's anything

scarier than putting on a new musical on Broadway. And for anybody who wants to

take a big risk, you should try and do that because that is about as scary as it gets.

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