Paula: Being as you are the new Artistic Director, what is your vision of The Citadel as you move forward into the future?
Bob: It’s very important to me that the Citadel becomes very proudly a regional theatre, that it connects with its community more than it has done in the past -- meaning its audience and its artists. I’ve committed the company to producing at least one Alberta-written play a year, a premier. I’ll be hiring at least 80 per cent talent whether it is acting, clothing, design, technical from the Alberta region, and just trying to broaden the audience base by attracting younger people as well. Paula: How do you balance your role between being the Artistic Director of the Citadel in general, and directing individual plays? Bob: They are very different jobs. It’s almost different sides of the brain. Artistic directing is an arts management position and directing is much more a creative telling of one story with a lot of components and pulling it all together. They are both full time jobs, so when I direct a play it takes about 12-14 hours a day to prepare and rehearse and research on top of the 10-12 hours a day being an Artistic Director. It simply doubles up; one comes in almost at dawn to do the office work, go into rehearsal, and then stay quite late to do more office work.
