By Mikayla Weiss, Sports Editor
[From PatrickAlparone.com]
Mr. Patrick Alparone has been teaching at Moreau Catholic High School for seven years. He teaches all of the theatre classes at Moreau. Here, we get to learn a little bit more about his life with an exclusive interview featuring Patrick Alparone.
Mikayla Weiss (MW): How long have you been teaching?
Patrick Alparone (PA): Since 2019
MW: What did you want to be when you were growing up?
PA: I went through a bunch of different things. I wanted to be a rockstar, tow truck driver, fisherman, baseball player, and then when I got to high school I decided I wanted to be an actor. It wasn’t academic, so I was good at it eventually.
[“Here’s me at 15. With my Southpark shirt and Doom 2 playing on my computer.”]
MW: What led you to becoming a theater teacher?
PA: My theater teacher, Arlene Hood, was teaching here in 2019, and she asked me to fill in. She asked if I would like to take over for her, and I said, “No, I’m an actor.” I continued filling in as a sub, and she asked again, and I again told her, “No, I’m an actor that does plays and films and commercials.” Then lockdown happened and we got back on campus and I’d grown such strong connections with the kids here that I decided that this is what I should be doing right now. Here I am now, 6 or 7 years later. I’m a hip guy, man.
MW: What was your first job?
PA: I worked at the restaurant which is now, “My Favorite Indian” restaurant, and I got fired in two weeks. I made a lot of expensive mistakes. I cut lettuce on a surface where they just cut raw chicken. I also threw out a bunch of towels in the trash. I had no idea what I was doing and I was also doing a play up in Cal State.
MW: What was your toughest job?
PA: My toughest job was when I was starting out as an actor and I was doing a lot of temporary jobs. I had to show up and set up 1,400 chairs for a Huey Lewis concert. I got paid $40 to work from 12am-4am. It was miserable. The buses weren’t running, so I had to spend half of my nights’ wages for a cab to get home.
MW: When did you start working?
PA: I started working at around 14-15. I wanted to buy CDs, so I got that job, washing dishes for two weeks.
MW: What were you like as a 15-year-old?
PA: At 15, I was an angry, defiant, shaggy-haired, aspiring rock star. I just hated everything. I was an angry child. I thought I was really tough, but I wasn’t.
MW: Has your style changed over the years?
PA: Yes. I think what you learn is when you get older, you don’t just become an adult and get frozen into that style. You keep evolving. The 31-year-old me is different from the 43-year-old me. I think having a child calmed me down. I’m healthier. I wear the same Henley and jeans every day, and the same pair of shoes in different colors. I’m pretty locked into my style.
MW: What changed when you became an adult?
PA: I became an adult when I first had my son. I continued being a teenager well through my 20s. There were a number of years there where I was just working as an actor and partying while sleeping on my brother’s living room floor. Literal years. Sleeping on a floor in the corner of a living room. Your 20s are interesting, because you learn how awful you can be to yourself.
[“Snow with Emerson, my son.”]
MW: What is the most challenging thing about acting?
PA: An actor is constantly trying to find more work. If you’re able to not lose your mind because you don’t have any jobs lined up, you’re probably going to be okay as an actor. But if you only see yourself as an actor and nothing else, you’re going to have a difficult time. Most people aren’t just one thing, they’re an actor but also a musician, a spouse, a father, or they’re good with mechanical things, or a chef.
The hardest thing about being an actor is being unemployed. Rejection is fine. It’s something you get used to. You face a lot of rejection, but eventually you get numb to it. The only thing you can do is be prepared and do your best.
MW: How did you transition from acting into teaching?
PA: I realized that the life of an actor is entirely dependent on other people. You’re not at all in control of your life. You have to wait for the writer to write the script, wait for the director to put you in the show, wait for the lighting designer to put light on you, so as a teacher, and also a director of theatre, I have some control over what the next year and what the next show is going to be like.
MW: What plays and movies have you worked on and what were your favorites?
PA: Anything Shakespeare was great. New plays and Shakespeare were my favorite. Hamlet is my favorite.
MW: What are some things you’d like to share you do outside of school?
PA: I’m a big gardener, and I love cooking. I cook a hell of a steak. I garden and I grow tomatoes, and I’m planting my garden right now for the spring. I cook, I garden, I clean, I teach, I direct, and I listen to and play music. During the summer I go on long train trips and camping with my son.
[“Me and my son Emerson on our annual 3 day Train trip to Chicago”]
MW: Do you have a recipe that you would like to share?
PA: Make sure you salt your steak and let it sit in the fridge for 24 hours before you put it on the grill. High heat, and let it rest for 10 minutes, and enjoy.
[Tomato Garden]
After learning more about Mr. Alparone, we learned that stability is rarely something given to you, it is something you have to create. In order to get into acting, you have to be thick-skinned and you have to have a lot of patience. With anything you truly want, your patience and hard work will pay off in the long run.
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