Tribute from Stephanie Cozart

Stephanie Cozart, Actor

I was in the last class at NTC for which Tony was active dean (and teacher). I'll never forget his phone call that came in the spring of 1994, inviting me to come to the conservatory. My roommate (in a thick East Texas dialect) shouted, "Oh my GAWD! There's a British guy on the phone!" It was my future calling. (That call led to everything--my career, my best friends, even my marriage). And for 3 years Tony stood as the shining example of the only way you can conduct yourself in the theatre: with total respect for yourself and your fellow artists, with ABSOLUTE, childlike delight and enthusiasm towards EVERY SINGLE THING you attempt, and with humbled, breathless awe that you've been given the opportunity to participate. No room for petty people. He made us feel we were above all that; we were ARTISTS. And we felt that, through him, we were connected to legends: Edith Evans, John Gielgud, William Shakespeare, for God's sake. We were a part of this great tradition, so we'd damn well better conduct ourselves accordingly! Months after I graduated, I was cast in my first Equity show: as Hypatia in Misalliance at the Denver Center, with Tony as Lord Summerhays. THE Tony Church was proposing to me onstage, and I was flirtatiously rebuking and tormenting him. It was a giddy thing. A feeling of arrival. In recent years, when I come back to Denver, I've been given the privilege of teaching NTC students myself. On the first day of class I tell them about this grand tradition they are joining, and how Tony Church showed me what that means.