Current Project:

Matthew is currently touring North America with the first national tour of Stephen Sondheim’s Company. As the replacement Equity production stage manager, he coordinates between the disparate creative and design teams, backstage departments, and large principal cast to ensure each performance is in line with the artistic vision, all rules and regulations are followed by the cast and management team, and any day-to-day concerns are addressed with humor and grace.

Recent Projects:

Matthew was recently the production stage manager for the second national tour of the Jesus Christ Superstar 50th Anniversary revival.

Before that, he was the assistant stage manager at Asolo Repertory Theatre for the world premier of Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens’ new musical Knoxville. This production was three years in the making, and it could not have been a more beautiful process. He worked with top-notch creators and actors to build the production from the ground up, including coordination of automation, flying goods, child performers, live musicians, and actor musicians tracking instruments around the stage.

He was also the rehearsal production assistant for Work Light Productions’ brand new touring musical An Officer and a Gentleman. As a vital part of the stage management team, he helped run the rehearsal room; tracked, printed, and distributed script and score changes; and worked with the assistant stage manager to prepare the running paperwork for touring. Then, while the tour was on the road, he came out after the holiday layoff to revamp the covid safety department. Here he worked to strengthen the relationship between each production group, focusing on how their collaboration could mitigate covid risks, and he implemented updated policies to better defend against the Omicron variant.

Before that, he was one of the management interns for Broadway Asia Company, helping them license, develop, and tour plays and musical theatre around the world. It was an incredible experience to meet artists from many different cultures, and he particularly enjoyed his small role in planning the Sound of Music Global Tour.

Biography:

Growing up as one-half of the twins of a writer mother and scientist father in a major Midwest college town, Matthew never lacked for avenues to explore his curiosity. When his inquisitiveness wasn’t getting him into trouble, he was able to learn concert percussion, jazz drums, and marching snare; explore history from around the world; and spend thousands of hours making high school theatre.

While his sister was bitten by the science bug, Matthew fell in love with the power of live theatre: the ability for story to bring people together, to grow in empathy, and also to make them reflect, or laugh, or cry. He knew, even then, that he wanted to spend his life creating art while collaborating with other people. The stage management program at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign gave him a chance to pursue this dream, and he still feels fortunate to have found them.

The U of I offered a breadth of opportunities both in history and in theatre. While pursuing his bachelor’s in fine arts, he was able to study opera, theatre, and dance stage management and learn how the cultures are similar and separate. The productions he worked on were as varied as devised musicals with the audience worked into the choreography; large operas with a 75-person orchestra, 150-person chorus, and 25 principal singers; Kabuki theatre; socially conscious post-modern dance concerts; and 24-hour new play festivals. He also had hands-on experiences in event management, including being the production coordinator for the Illinois High School Theatre Festival, the largest non-competitive festival of its kind.

Summers were spent working at summer stocks, such as the Colorado Shakespeare Festival, Dorset Theatre Festival, Connecticut Repertory Theatre, and New York Stage and Film’s Powerhouse Theatre. Then, after graduating with a BFA with high honors, Matthew took a yearlong apprenticeship with Asolo Repertory Theatre and found an artistic home. It was here that he discovered his true passions: touring shows to audiences and developing new musicals.

Since then, he returned to Asolo Rep most recently to work on Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahren’s new musical, Knoxville. Matthew has also spent time in New York City, helping to create new work, including Mississippi, The Musical (NYMF 2019 Best of Fest Award Winner), and Resistance by Regina Taylor, as well as on tour, taking musicals around the country. He’s done the Broadway first national tour of Marianne Elliott’s Company; a holiday tour of A Christmas Story, The Musical; TheaterWorksUSA’s first national tour of Rosie Revere, Engineer and Friends; Work Light Production’s first national tour of An Officer and a Gentleman, The Musical and second national tour of Jesus Christ Superstar; and the rehearsal process for a reimagined touring production of Xanadu that unfortunately never made it out of New York.

In addition to his work, Matthew is passionate about narrowing the pay gap in theatre, starting with the entry-level internship positions, and fostering an anti-racist theatre industry that promotes the health, safety, and stories of all artists.

When not in a theatre, he can often be found at a tea house, botanical garden, cider bar, restaurant patio, or concert hall.