Stage Craft: Phil Parker brings iconic characters to life

By Catherine Godbey | Living 50 Plus

Clad in a long, curly black wig, a pirate’s hat and a hook covering his right hand, Phil Parker stepped onto the Princess Theatre stage as Captain Hook and checked another role off his bucket list.

“I’ve been lucky enough that I’ve gotten to play a lot of the roles I’ve had on my bucket list. I guess that’s what happens when you’re involved with theater for as long as I have been,” the 56-year-old Parker said.

With 30 years of acting experience, Parker is a mainstay in the north Alabama theater scene, performing with the Bank Street Players, Dream Weavers, Outlet Stage Company, Calhoun Theatre, the Athenian Players, Huntsville Theatre, Renaissance Theatre and more.

“I think whether you are in Huntsville or Decatur, everyone wants to be in a show with Phil Parker and everyone knows who he is in the theater world,” Erika Ladner with Bank Street Players said. “Whenever we have brought over people from the Huntsville area, they are like, ‘Oh, we get to work with Phil?’ We get to use him as our leverage and tempt people with, ‘Don’t you want to do a show with Phil Parker?’”

Parker’s involvement with the hobby that has spanned three decades and around 100 shows all started on a dare.

“A couple of friends I worked with were doing theater for Calhoun and I went to see them in a show. They sort of dared me to audition for the next show thinking I wouldn’t do it. We had had many discussions where I would say I didn’t know if I was brave enough to do theater. But they dared me to audition and I did and I got cast on my first audition,” Parker said.

In that first production, Parker portrayed an 85-year-old man in Calhoun Theatre’s “A Small Family Business” under the now retired Bill Provin and Bubba Godsey.

“While we were in rehearsals, I didn’t realize I was falling in love with theater. But once you get that first round of applause from an audience, a lot of people say that’s when the bug bites and it did bite me in a big way. I thought I’d enjoy doing theater for a while, but I thought it would be a fad. It wasn’t a fad. I guess I got the bug bite and the bug infection,” Parker said with a laugh.

That experience prompted the then 26-year-old Parker to enroll in Calhoun Community College and earn a theater degree. In those early years, Parker performed in five to six shows a year, sometimes juggling three shows at a time.

“Learning lines for three different shows is not easy. It was almost like an addiction for me at that point. I was having the best time,” Parker said.

Immediately after “A Small Family Business,” Parker started becoming involved with community theater groups. His first community theater performance took place in 1996 with Huntsville Little Theatre’s “Witness to the Prosecution.”

“A friend told me about an audition that was going on that night. I went and read a couple of scenes,” Parker said. “At the end of the night, the director announced the cast. When I heard my friend’s name, I leaned over and said, ‘Great job. Congratulations.’ As I finished saying that I heard my name, but I didn’t hear what part. I asked my friend if he heard what I got. He said, ‘Sir Wilfrid.’ I said, ‘Great, what is that?’ He said, ‘That is the lead.’ I owe a debt of gratitude to John Miller, the director of that show.”

Along with Miller, individuals who impacted Parker’s theatrical journey include Godsey and Provin, who he recognizes in his playbill bios with a nod to “B&B,” and actors Sam Marsh and Fred Sayers.

“Sam and Fred were huge in the Huntsville theater scene. Fred was the guy on those old car commercials with the loud jacket. He was the first one I did an improv performance with. He was so incredible at that,” Parker said. “There were a lot of those old guys who influenced me. It’s crazy to think that now I’m the old guy. It’s a bit of a wake-up call.”

Parker realized he transitioned to the “old guy” legion after playing Scrooge in “Humbug” from 2017 to 2021.

“All those kids, who I didn’t get to work very closely with, unfortunately, they all remember me, but now that they are all grown, I don’t recognize them. It occurred to me I need to start paying more attention to the people I work with, especially the younger folks because if the experience is as formative for them as it was for me, that’s kind of a big deal. I feel like I need to be a good example for them,” Parker said.

According to the actors who share the stage with Parker, he is fulfilling the role of a supportive and caring veteran actor.

“It is so important to have veteran actors like Phil because we are training up a younger generation that needs to see that. They need to see the professionalism, the showing up ready to work and the acting skills Phil has,” Ladner said.

Echoing Ladner, Susan Thompson, a veteran actor and theater director in Decatur, described Parker as polite, punctual, prepared, respectful, supportive and a team player.

“Phil Parker, simply by sharing his time and talents over the years, has raised the bar on the kind of characters we have become accustomed to seeing on local stages,” Thompson said. “Phil is an incredibly talented and unselfish individual who leads by example. Any person, whether a seasoned actor or a first time participant, can learn from Phil. I’ve been doing this for over 40 years, and I watched and learned from him during the short time we shared the stage.”

Ladner first crossed paths with Parker during the 2017 premiere of “Humbug,” written by Decatur’s Chuck Puckett.

“He played Scrooge. I had a small role and played his mother in a flashback of when he was a child,” Ladner said. “If you ever have the opportunity to share the stage with Phil, you know that it is a treat. He always comes prepared and is the utmost professional. He is also so humble and hard on himself. I love that about him because it shows he is still working at his craft.”

Along with Scrooge and Captain Hook, Parker’s list of roles includes Riff Raff in “Rocky Horror Picture Show,” Nick Bottom in “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” Dogberry in “Much Ado About Nothing,” Scrooge in “Humbug,” Captain Lesgate in “Dial ‘M’ for Murder,” Father Flynn in “Doubt,” Herr Schultz in “Cabaret,” Father in “Eurydice,” Patsy in “Monty Python’s Spamalot” and Horace Vandergelder in “Hello Dolly.”

“Phil Parker is like a local Tom Hanks or Meryl Streep. He is an actor, who is incredibly versatile, can physically transform himself into a character, and who is respected by all who work with him due to his work ethic, his talent and his ability to make every person involved in a show feel appreciated,” Thompson said.

In “Hello Dolly,” staged by Dream Weavers in 2023, Parker played opposite Thompson as Dolly.

“Hearing that he and I would be working together absolutely thrilled me. Although we both had been active in community theater for years, our paths had never crossed,” Thompson said. “For years I had heard Phil’s name — here in Decatur, and in Huntsville. There was never a word said about him that wasn’t positive. I learned very quickly why.”

Like most in community theater, Parker’s involvement is voluntary and extends beyond the stage. Parker creates playbills and designs show posters for Bank Street Players.

For Parker, being involved with college and community theater shaped his life.

“I made some of my best friends doing those first shows. I met my wife (Kim Parker, director of the Alabama Center for the Arts and Calhoun’s dean of fine arts) doing my very first show. We were first formally introduced in Calhoun’s Black Box Theatre. That is the same place we got married,” Parker said.

Along with on the stage, the community can spot Parker at his day job — the lead gallery explainer and creating the in-house video production at the Cook Museum.

Upcoming community theater productions include Calhoun Theatre’s “Chicago the Musical” on Oct. 9-12, Bank Street Players’ “Junie B. Jones Jr.: The Musical” on Oct. 24-26, Athenian Players’ “The Game” on Nov. 20-23 and Dream Weavers’ “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory” on Dec. 5-7. Parker will play the role of Grandpa Joe in “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.”

“Decatur is one of the most supportive theater scenes I’ve ever been part of. Both major groups, Bank Street and Dream Weavers, have each other’s back to a degree you don’t see anywhere else. Decatur is so incredibly supportive, even extending to Calhoun, the Athenian Players and the Outlet kids,” Parker said. “The companies work in sort of a symbiosis that’s unheard of in the community theater scene.”

One-on-One with Phil Parker

What are some of your most memorable roles?

In 2000, I was in “Holy Ghost” and played a character with only about five lines, but he had one long gut-wrenching monologue. It was the first time I did a part where I realized I had the audience right where I wanted them. I could’ve stopped talking for five minutes and they would’ve been on the edge of their seats. That’s not a testament to my performance, but to the monologue itself.

I’ve done “The Woman in Black” three times. It’s a ghost story. It’s difficult to think of a live show being scary enough to scare you like a horror movie, but there are some moments in that play where we had people screaming.

A couple of years ago I did “Spam-A-Lot.” I think I had the most fun doing that show. If I could quit my show tomorrow and do that show for a living, I absolutely would not hesitate. It was the most drama-free backstage for a large-scale production. I grew up with Monty Python. “Holy Grail” was one of my staples. Getting a chance to be part of that was absolutely the best time ever.

My first Shakespearean lead was Petruchio in “The Taming of the Shrew.” I had two different girls playing the role of Kate opposite me. We had a rather large fight scene. I had to learn it with two different people and they were both totally different fighting styles. One of them was Kim. She understood how to do stage slaps and fake things and let me do the physical part. The other girl, bless her, she was very into it and she beat the living crap out of me. I wouldn’t have changed it. Both of them completely different, but both did a fantastic job. It was a challenge to do that physicality and still handle the Shakespearean English.

Are there any roles remaining on your bucket list?

One of the first Broadway-style shows I got to see was “Les Misérables.” That has always been on my bucket list. Monsieur Thénardier in that show is one I think I could really sink my teeth into. I would also love to do “Sweeny Todd.” The more recent one is “Beetlejuice.” It is still on tour and still very much in the zeitgeist, so it hasn’t made it to the community theater circuit yet. One of these days maybe. We’ll see.