A sad day for many of us in Michigan…

This morning we lost a wonderful man: Jim Posante passed away. A good friend, a talented director/actor/choreographer, a gifted and beloved teacher, Jim will be missed by many.

Yesterday morning, Jim suffered a stroke. Word went out through the grapevine and networks that he was in a coma, and wouldn’t be coming out of it. Then, an amazing thing happened: the hospital waiting room filled up with people. And so did the hallway. Some came and stayed for hours, some for a few minutes – people came and went all day long – students and families from the school where he tought and directed plays, and from all the theatres in the area, actors and directors, stage managers and technicians, dancers and singers – dozens and dozens of people of all ages and backgrounds, all of these people came, with love in their hearts, to say their goodbyes.

It was a beautiful, sad, amazing thing. Jim had such a good soul, and it was obvious that he meant a great deal to a great many people.

I first worked with Jim in 1992 – there we became friends, working together occasionally, and it was a few years ago that I had to take over a show that he was directing because he suffered a heart attack. He made a great recovery and, as his partner Charlie remarked yesterday, the last few years were some of his happiest and most productive. Over the years, Jim and I – both of us short, about 5’3″ – would joke that one day we’d have to stage The Hobbit, with us as the Hobbits. In fact, when we accepted the award for Take Me Out being the best directed show of that season, we joked at the podium, thanking “everyone back in the Shire”.

On my keyring, there is a small gift that Jim gave me as thanks for bringing that show to completion – because of our long running joke, it meant a lot. It’s a replica of The One Ring, from The Hobbit.

Jim was a wonderful guy, and an inspiration: he loved what he did, and the people he did it with, and he loved life. I, like all who knew him, will think of him often, and miss him dearly.

“There is more in you of good than you know, child…some courage and some wisdom, blended in measure. If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world…”
-“The Hobbit” (Chapter XVIII: The Return Journey)