Kirk Davidson
I was one of Dr. Richard Tinapp's students at UW–La Crosse in the late 1970s. I have regretted for many years that I never had the chance to thank him.
For decades afterward, whenever I found myself in a difficult rehearsal as an actor or director, I would stop and ask myself, "What would Dr. Tinapp do?" He remained one of my teachers long after I left his classroom.
One memory has stayed with me for nearly fifty years.
I was playing Oswald in a scene from Ibsen's *Ghosts*. At the end of the scene, as Oswald's mind slowly slips away, his final words are, "The sun... the sun."
When Dr. Tinapp came to evaluate the scene, he gave me the greatest compliment I have ever received as an actor. He told me it was the closest I had come to authentic, lived acting rather than performance. There were no tricks, no theatrics, no pushing for effect. He said it showed that I had real promise as an actor, not just as a performer.
Until that moment, I had often been told that I was trying too hard. I never understood what that meant. Dr. Tinapp taught me the difference. In that scene, I finally stopped trying to force the performance and simply let the character live. It changed the way I thought about acting forever.
I carried that lesson into every production I directed and every class I taught for the rest of my career.
Thank you, Dr. Tinapp, for seeing something in a young actor that he could not yet see in himself. Your influence lasted a lifetime.
Kirk Davidson
Former Director of Speech and Theatre
Howard College
Big Spring, Texas