Wildcat Theatre director takes final bow

In 1999, James Simmons was late for a job interview at I.E. Weldon Secondary school in Lindsay. Not being from the area, he drove right past his turn and got halfway to Bobcaygeon before phoning the school to ask for directions.

“I went into it knowing there’s no way they were going to give me the job,” Simmons said.

Now, 27 years later the English teacher is preparing for retirement. While he doesn’t retire from teaching until next year, he recently wrapped up his final pro duction at Wildcat Theatre.

With a background in teaching drama, he was able to apply what he knew to English. When Weldon started offering the International Baccalaureate program, it was decided that it would be easier for students to study three or four plays as opposed to three novels or 50 poems.

That job of teaching plays was given to Simmons. With his experience he’s been able to help the kids stand up and actually act the play out as opposed to just reading it. “They have a greater understanding of how plays hit the audience.”

Part of the reason his students walk away with an appreciation for theatre, is every year he takes a group of them to Stratford. Most years these trips involve seeing a Shakespearean play. “It’s really amazing because on the bus ride home, you always hear the kids talking about, ‘I finally get it,’ … They see how standing up on a stage and saying a bunch of words to people can result in some sort of magic.”

On top of teaching, Simmons has been involved in Wildcat Theatre every year since 1999 in some capacity, aside from strike years and COVID. He’s helped put on 47 productions and has directed or co-directed 13 of them. 

“Most of my shows over the course of my career have been in some way associated with Shakespeare,” he said. His final show was Henry V, his favourite play. To him, Shakespeare doesn’t just have interesting plots, but “has this capacity of being able to say the exact right thing.”

During the final bows, it wasn’t just Simmons who was emotional. “(The students) all knew that it was my last show. And some of them were sharing that emotion because it was their last high school show.”

At the last performance Simmons was presented with a plaque by his Wildcat Theatre collaborator and fellow teacher, Danielle Lazarin. “It’s apparently going to hang somewhere around the theatre in our cafeteria where the shows get done. So there’ll always be a little piece of me there.”

“I’m going to use next year as a as a way of passing the baton,” Simmons said. While he knows that those taking over are fully capable, he wants to make sure he can be a resource for them before he fully retires. 

Simmons said that his time working with students on these productions has been the highlight of his career. He thinks to the faces on Grade 9 students who have never been in a performance before when they hear the audience applauding for the first time. “This is the wonderful thing about theatre, it is so communal that you really do feel like you’re part of something that’s bigger than yourself.”