Workman-like attitude gets roles for theater veteran
By David Burke, QUAD-CITY TIMES -- August 20, 2004

It’s been three decades since Pat Flaherty first set foot on a Quad-City stage, and he’s kept his love for community theater and workman-like attitude throughout those 30 years.

“I always look for stuff that’s challenging,” Flaherty said. “I don’t look for an easy romp on the stage. I’d just as soon work at it.”

Flaherty first started in theater in the area in 1974, when he and friends Bob and Peggy Hanske performed “The Rhinoceros” — at a nursing home.

Since then he’s been a part of numerous local theater groups, including New Ground Theatre, where he has the male role in the two-person romantic comedy-drama “Talley’s Folly,” which opens next weekend.

“For being 30 years old, my God, it says some things that are just as fresh as ever,” he said of the Lanford Wilson script. “That’s what a classic will do for you.”

In “Talley’s Folly,” Flaherty portrays an accountant from St. Louis who breaks through the shell of small-town girl Sally Talley, played by Lora Adams, in the summer of 1944.

Chris Jansen, New Ground artistic director and director of the play, said Flaherty came immediately to mind when casting the play.

“He’s a dream to work with,” she said. “He’s always very positive, always very hard working. With ‘Talley’s Folly,’ the show is 97 minutes long and he is on stage every minute. He never exits, and he starts the show with a 10-minute monologue. That’s a nice chunk of talking before anyone else even comes on.”

With a shortened practice schedule, Jansen asked that Flaherty and Adams memorize all their lines before rehearsals began. Jansen said he not only did that, but would go home and work out his own trouble spots every night.

“He’s not only in demand because he’s talented, but because he has a fabulous work ethic,” she said.

When he’s cast in a show, Flaherty said, the script gets top priority.

“It’s kind of an obsession,” he said. “Once I get into a play, that’s my life. I stop reading the paper, I just read the script and that’s about it. I get command of the material. Once you get that, you can do anything with it.”

Employed at the Rock Island Arsenal, Flaherty began performing in community theater when he got out of the military.

“I’d always been in theater in high school. It was just a good way to spend my time,” he said. “I got pulled into it and just stayed at it for some reason. Don’t know why. I never aspired to anything, I just wanted to do theater.”

His love for theater got a boost at age 30 when he first began doing Shakespeare.

“Shakespeare’s quite an education,” he said. “Quite a lot of light process going on there.

“That’s what got me hooked into it and that’s what’s kept me there.”

Flaherty said he’s not into theater for applause or accolades.

“I don’t do it for the audiences, I do it for the other actors and the people who want to play make believe,” he said.

He said his favorite show is always the show he’s currently doing, but said he had a fondness for “Richard III,” “A Man For All Seasons” and “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”

Flaherty — whose wife, Patti, is also heavily involved in theater — has been a part of a number of numerous local theater companies, and said he enjoys all of the troupes.

“I’m different whereas I don’t think of theater as a building, and not a lot of other people do,” he said. “It’s not a place to take care of and maintain. I think it’s just the written word that you do wherever you have to do it at.”

Flaherty said he is choosy about the roles he takes.

“I try to stay away from a lot of stuff that’s too commercial, that people would like,” he said. “I find I don’t like that kind of stuff. It’s not worth your time to memorize tripe. If you have to memorize something, it might as well be good stuff.”

He said enjoys the challenge of a difficult script.

“When they’re really hard, they’re rewarding,” he said. “You’re waking up at 2 o’clock in the middle of the night going, ‘I don’t know my lines.’ Most plays I hate the worst are the ones that come out the best.”

At age 52, he said “old age kind of snuck up on me,” and is transitioning himself from leading man roles into character roles. That will open up new challenges, he said, and a new list of roles he wants.

“As soon as I pry (Genesius Guild guru Don) Wooten’s hands off King Lear, I’d like to play that,” he said. “He’s not gonna let that happen.”

David Burke can be contacted at (563) 383-2400 or dburke@qctimes.com.

Return to News&Reviews Page