Stagedoor: Zach Shotwell

Zach Shotwell needed some air. It was his second day as an apprentice at Florida Studio Theatre, and he and his colleagues wasted no time getting to work. After touring the campus, they dove right into the busy audition schedule for the theater’s Write A Play program. Out on the back deck, Shotwell was able to pause and concentrate.

Over the next two years, this would become his sanctuary when he needed a break. From here, as an observer, the aspiring actor learned the behind-the-scenes workings of the theater.

Now, after two stints as an acting apprentice at FST (first in 2013 and then again in spring 2015), he has returned to one of his favorite theaters — this time in a professional role. The 28-year-old actor is performing in FST’s main stage season opener, the physical period comedy “One Man, Two Guvnors,” running through Jan. 10 in the Gompertz Theatre.

Reflecting on his hectic time as an apprentice, Shotwell says he wouldn’t have had it any other way.

“I was exhausted most of the time, but for me I found it motivating because everything I was asked to do had to do with theater.”

 Playing the role of Gareth, the head waiter of a restaurant in the seaside town of Brighton in 1963 England, Shotwell says his past duties at FST were ample preparation.

“As an apprentice, we’d be doing pretty much everything,” says Shotwell. 

He and his apprentice cohort would work in every possible section of the theater, from behind the box office and the bar to helping build sets and making phone calls for the marketing department.

His largest role as an apprentice was as the Lion in FSTs’ children’s theater production “Androcles and the Lion.” Shotwell would perform sometimes three times a day to children from around the county who, for some, this would be their first time inside a theater. 

“It was very fulfilling to perform for all these kids,” says Shotwell. “He’s a character that the kids were at first a little afraid of, but by the time the show was over and we were saying goodbye to the kids, each one would walk by and show me their best roar.”

Shotwell says his time running back and forth and performing different tasks as an apprentice prepared him for his current physically demanding job as a waiter in a show that is built on throwing people back and forth between two crime bosses.

During the rehearsal process before the show opened Nov. 18, Shotwell juggled multiple responsibilities, such as learning lines, blocking and the timing of his physical comedy. 

“Just like when I was an apprentice, I’ve just got to focus on what’s important at the moment and worry about other things as they come,” says Shotwell.

Even though his days aren’t as chaotic as they once were, he still finds time in between rehearsals to get back to his favorite spot on the deck and soak it all in. 

He says he likes to think about the entire theatrical operation, from the theater’s colorful caretaker, Dr. Nik, to the staff, and this year’s class of apprentices and interns. Shotwell says he now has a better appreciation for what it means to be an actor.

“Now that I’m an actor in a main stage company, I think about what my bigger role is,” he says. “I’m not just entertaining an audience. I’m helping support a whole theater company and the apprentices and all the work that they have to do in order for the show I’m in to go on each night.”