Artist Story: Jeff Bouthiette

“You’re a talented guy, but if you want to write theater music, you need to focus. I don’t know what’s going on with this whole ‘acting thing,’ but you can’t get distracted by that.” My mentor sipped from his cardboard coffee cup, pursing his lips as he considered how to get his point across without being mean. “I know it’s not what you want to hear, but someone needs to tell you that.”

I was 27, and at the time performing several times a week (in a diaper) in the Jeff Award-winning show Jerry Springer: The Opera at the Bailiwick. As this was one of the more satisfying performance experiences of my life, I didn’t want to consider the prospect that a career as a composer/lyricist required a devotion that necessitated ending all other avenues of artistic expression.

My mentor was wrong about one thing, though. Someone had already told me to “focus.” In fact, people had been telling me that for nearly a decade. I spent my twenties trying to find my “thing.” I came to Chicago after college to act—did a little of that; started music directing for the theater; somehow fell into performing sketch comedy and improvisation; became a music director for sketch; toured as a music director for the Second City National Tour; did several cruise ship contracts; wrote more singer/songwriter-type stuff; founded a theater company; began directing theater again after a five-year hiatus; explored playwriting... (I’m missing something in there, I'm sure). In retrospect, it feels like I must have been afflicted with career ADHD.

But I was never happy doing just one thing. When I was acting in a show, all I wanted to do was find time to write. When I was sequestered on a cruise ship— playing the piano twice a week for a sketch show and writing music for hours alone in my tiny cabin—I would have killed to be able to perform onstage again. While accompanying a children’s show several times a day for months, I wished the music and lyrics those talented actors were singing were mine. Even now, when I’m feeling tired or beaten down (or just generally cranky), I imagine an idyllic, indefinite vacation, disappearing to some cozy cabin in the mountains somewhere to write a musical, a play, or perhaps just some whiny songs about how life is hard and people are jerks.

Now, as I enter my 30th year (just writing that makes me shake a little), I realize what a gift my artistic “ADHD” has been. For one thing, if I get bored, I always have another project I can work on. There’s always a monologue to memorize, a song to write, a show to improvise, a rehearsal to run, a scene to complete. But more importantly, each of my artistic pursuits feeds and helps deepen the others. Much of the playfulness that has developed both in my musical-theater writing and in writing for myself as a performer has sprung from the off-kilter joy of both improvising and music directing for improv. My musicality has made me a better director, enabling me to tune into the symphonic nature (or perhaps sonata-form nature) of scenes and helping me key in to how music can enhance and complement even non-musical theater.

There will always be a place for the specialist in any artistic field. I respect people who have their one “thing” and who are committed to honing that one special skill set. And of course, a certain level of commitment is necessary to make any pursuit worthwhile and not just another hobby. But for me, every discovery of creative expression and avenue I explore provides both the tools and the fuel for my current project. If a turn of phrase isn’t right for a particular scene, I might try to work it into a new song. If a point of view doesn’t fit in a theater song, I think might use it for a character I’m playing. Maybe a tune doesn't lend itself to lyrics, but it captures exactly the mood of a new play. This complex interaction of forms and modes inspires me, and the collaborators who excite me almost always engage in a layered world of perpetual play. They take the unexpected turn and they surprise, because they are always exploring, always expanding.  

Perhaps my mentor was right. Maybe I would be further along in my career as a composer/lyricist if I’d focused on that to the exclusion of everything else. But I know that I would not have matured in the same way, artistically or personally, and that my work would have suffered as a result.

Jeff Bouthiette is an accompanist, music director, composer/lyricist, director, actor, improviser, and playwright in Chicago. His original music and lyrics have been heard with the Second City National Tour, Victory Gardens Theatre’s Fresh Squeezed Series, Stage Left Theatre, Theatre Building Chicago, Bare Boned Theatre, Jazz Hands Across America, the Cornservatory, the R.Ed.I Foundation, East LA Repertory, and in King is a Fink's award-winning short film Snow Bunny. In 2007, Jeff was a participant in the Johnny Mercer Songwriters Project. He is the Artistic Director of Bare Boned Theatre.