Hello Fountain Family! My name is Annie Barker and I will be the Production Intern at the Fountain Theatre this summer. I’m an incoming senior at Loyola Marymount University, studying Theatre Arts and English because I thrive under the looming cloud that is inevitable unemployment. Outside of the theatre, I love going to Disneyland, volunteering at animal shelters, and searching for a good cup of coffee.
I grew up in the rainy city of Portland, Oregon. I found comfort within the rows of Powell’s City of Books. A voracious reader, I would always ask my dad what the books he was reading were about. He would respond with “a man searching for the meaning of life.” As a nine year old, this response was incredibly annoying. As I’ve gotten older though, I’ve realized the importance of this question. As a result, I seek to write, create, watch, and perform stories that follow the convoluted path to the meaning of life.
I am interested in any and all aspects of the theatre, though I have found the greatest joy and rewards in acting, directing, and playwriting. This past fall I made my full-length directing debut with Neil LaBute’s reasons to be pretty. This project helped me confirm my love for directing, leading me to my current project—a senior thesis production of Ruby Rae Spiegel’s Dry Land. While choosing to do a play about abortion at a Catholic Jesuit university may seem challenging, it is the challenge that makes me want to tackle this piece head on.
Theatre people love using the phrase blessed. Take a quick glance in any program and you will see “so-and-so is so blessed to be…” However, I believe that blessed is the only way to describe how I feel to be working with Fountain Theatre this summer. I cannot wait to dive into this work, helping a theatre company do the exact thing I aspire to do in all of my work—creating work that matters, stimulates conversation, and pushes us to examine our own lives and purpose.
That being said, I am so honored to be a part of this family and look forward to the craziness and creation this summer will entail. Let the journey begin!
This internship is sponsored by the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors through the Los Angeles County Arts Commission.
