Theatre Grads Return to Support ENMU Drama Festival

By Anna George

Current ENMU students and high schoolers statewide expressed their love of theatre with the help of alumni at the 63rd annual ENMU Drama Festival. The four-day, student-directed festival featured workshops, high school performances and events including a dance, film screening and ENMU’s first spring show “Antigone.”

The 2018 festival was also a homecoming of sorts, due to its three guests of honor, all ENMU theatre alumni and previous Drama Fest directors.

Ryan Jason Cook (BFA 05), an Albuquerque local who graduated with a degree in theatre performance, presented his award-winning web series “Thank You 5,” a mockumentary about theatre life. He also offered wisdom for students interested in similar endeavors.

Ryan Jason Cook

Photo by Alisha Trujillo

“You can film a web series on your iPhone these days, and if you’re going into film, I actually recommend it,” Cook said. He also covered the film climate in Albuquerque and what it takes to make it in the industry.

“It is all about collaboration. It’s not just the main people, the director, or the director of photography; it is everyone.”

Leonard Madrid (BFA 97) and Landall Goolsby (BFA 95) joined Cook to teach their own workshops.

Madrid, who has a degree in universitytheatre studies, ran the festival as an assistant to Goolsby in 1996 and as head director the next year. This year, Madrid came back to teach comedic improvisation. He currently teaches theatre at Central New Mexico Community College and the University of New Mexico. He also acts as the technical director for the Blackout Theatre Company in Albuquerque, but he says he could not have done any of that without his time at Eastern.

“The program is built to create polymaths and allowsstudents to learn more than just one job,” Madrid said.“They allow students to make brilliant works without alot of resources.”

Leonard Madrid

Photo by Alisha Trujillo

Landall, who has played more than 40 TV and film roles since 2001, is also the owner of Landall’s Box Office, a Portales-based movie store. He took a break from traveling and auditioning to teach a class about where the best place to locate post-college is for the film and theatre landscape.

Landall Goolsby

Photo by Alisha Trujillo

The three alumni were an essential piece of the Drama Festival puzzle during their time as students, and current students were grateful that they returned to help out during this year’s festivities.