Theatre South officially welcomed social sciences teacher Britney Kouma as the new director on Thursday January 9, 2025 as rehearsals for Legally Blonde commenced.
Kouma is taking over for Catharine Rademacher who worked as Theatre South’s director for 33 years. Kouma expressed her worries about taking over, saying that “there’s a lot of hats that have to be worn,” she continued, “and now I have to be not just the director but I’m the costume designer; I’m the prop master; I’m in charge of organizing everything which technically is usually a production manager’s in charge or making a lot of those decisions.”
Kouma isn’t entirely new to theater though, doing it throughout college and a little in highschool. One of her favorite roles was Evil Tina from She Kills Monsters, a play she expressed she’d enjoy putting on at South. “That was my freshman role and it was like my introduction, almost, to actual theater.”
Not receiving a degree in theater, she still earned an endorsement, meaning she can teach a class in it. Kouma also dipped her toes into Theatre South last year, working as a stage manager for Annie. Helping with a musical was new for her, most of her theater experience coming from plays. She said, “getting…that vision and understanding while just being the stage manager for the show was great,” and definitely something that has assisted her while preparing for Legally Blonde.
What being a stage manager couldn’t prepare her for though, was the balance of being a teacher and a director. Kouma described her frustration with handling both, as typically she’s able to stay organized. In order to stay on top of it, she said “making sure that I schedule enough time to be okay, mentally and [am] able to enjoy my life while handling my school stuff and the show and all of the different things I have to get done,” is the most important thing, to her however hard it might be.
Kouma’s schedule isn’t the only thing she needs to balance. As a teacher and a director, she has to balance being an authority figure and a friend. To combat that, Kouma tries to surround her cast and crew with people they can talk to. Students tend to be frightened to approach teachers with issues, but in theater, that can result in problems that throw off the show schedule. She said, “I just really try to reiterate the fact that I’m willing to listen and never get angry if issues pop up, and try to give them other outlets to talk to because it’s important that they talk to somebody,” whether it be herself, a stage manager, or a peer, “because it’s more important about me finding out about the issue than whether it comes directly to me or somebody else.”
