Theater Founders Remember Good and Bad Times

Editor's Note: This is the second in a four-part look at the Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey . Come back each day through Saturday to read more, including a look at what to expect this historic season, and a timeline of five decades of theater.

Paul Barry has spent a lifetime in the theater, including nearly 30 years as the founder and artistic director of the New Jersey Shakespeare Festival.

Known by many as a strong-willed authoritarian who implemented his vision with precise and uncompromising detail, Barry experienced his share of conflicts during his long tenure with the company.

In 1985, he said, a personal conflict with one “very powerful man” (who he refused to name) evolved into a five-year fight for control of the festival. By this point, several sources claim, Barry was trying to do too much by himself and the results sometimes showed onstage.

“That’s what I always did,” Paul Barry said in a recent interview about criticisms of his workload. “I had been doing that since 1954. She [Ellen Barry, his wife, producing director and frequent leading lady] did everything else. All I had to do was produce and direct, and that was a snap. … I was there every day, seven days a week, for six months at a time. It’s not work. It’s fun.”

 “Paul was a good guy,” said former trustee Mike Schlesinger, who was among the board members who voted to replace the Barrys in 1991. “He did a lot of good work.”

Schlesinger, though, referred to some of the performances he saw there as “quite awkward.”

“The first show I saw there was ‘Titus Andronicus’ and I was blown away,” said longtime trustee Richard McGlynn, who to that point was at most a casual theater fan. “I remember Paul and Ellen did a number of plays in rep and that was really fun. I remember Paul did a wonderful Cyrano.”

After several years of escalating conflict, though, the trustees agreed it was time for new leadership and the Barrys were let go. Following a national search, Bonnie J. Monte was hired to replace Paul Barry and the company changed its name to the .

“I fought it every step of the way,” Paul Barry said. “I didn’t want to leave. We were still doing good work, I was still very healthy.”

“Generally, I liked it a lot,” said actor J.C. Hoyt, a member of the company from 1974 to 1990. “I loved doing the rotating rep and I think the audience enjoyed it, too. But as you might expect, conflicts come up.”

 “It was a tumultuous but rewarding time,” said John Pietrowski, a former company member who went on to direct in Madison. “I think in some ways he was misunderstood. What you have to remember is that he got it going. He was a pioneer at a time when there was not a lot of theater in New Jersey. It takes a lot of chutzpah to start a Shakespeare Festival. It was an act of will, an act of determination.”

Barry recalled his final production with pride— “Death of a Salesman”—with himself in the lead role of Willy Loman and Ellen playing “the other woman.” This family affair included their daughter, Shannon, speaking the voices of Willy Loman’s children on a wire recorder.

“The night of the last performance, we struck the set, got in the car, left and never came back,” he said.

“He was a very good Willy Loman,” McGlynn said.

Paul Barry has experienced serious health problems in recent years and the Barrys are currently preparing to move from their home of 35 years to a smaller place, also in Morristown. They remain clearly devoted to each other.

They expressed some lingering resentment over their ouster, although both of them also moved on to continue their stage careers in regional theaters across the country. They claim they were let go without severance or a genuinely expressed appreciation for what they accomplished.

“We made mistakes, we are not totally blameless,” Ellen Barry said. “But some of the things they said at the time were insulting and untrue.”

Paul Barry added his displeasure that the company, in his opinion, never acknowledged the essential role Ellen played in the company, which included helping to establish the New Jersey Theatre Group, now the New Jersey Theatre Alliance.

Both Barrys, however, expressed pride that the company they founded and nurtured continues to thrive in its 50^th year.

“We certainly have no animosity towards Bonnie Monte. But the company is celebrating its 50^th year, and the first 29 years were us,” Ellen Barry said. “I’m very proud of what we did together.”

“I’m ambiguous [about the anniversary],” Paul Barry said. “They treated us badly, very badly … But in a sense, I’m glad it’s still running. They collaborated with the state and the college a lot more than I would have been willing to do.”

They received an invitation to the 50^th anniversary gala, but do not plan on attending.

“Given the circumstances of our departure, I’m not sure we would be comfortable attending,” Ellen Barry said.