ABOUT NATHAN

Really, this is all my grandmother’s fault. When she brought me to a community theater production of Peter Pan when I was 3, she couldn’t know that she was sealing my entire fate, but that’s precisely what she did. Though I was too young to recall, the story goes that three year old me yelled “make them come back!” at intermission, and since then, not much has changed. 

Raised in Madison Wisconsin, I got my start in community theater, playing “The Applause Sign” in a production of “Annie” at age 6. From there, I sought out every role and show possible, notably playing both Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn at separate points. This led me to attending college at The Boston Conservatory, where I discovered an entirely new side of myself. 

The only thing more fun than singing with your friends at 2 a.m. in a bright studio is making your friends sing your songs at 2 a.m. in a bright studio. The Boston Conservatory gave me a militia of freakishly talented friends to bounce ideas off of, and I quickly began directing and writing things for them to show off in. I stumbled into the Songwriting Emphasis, and the next chapter of my theatrical obsession began. The joy I had as a performer was even more heightened as a writer—and after a few stabs at musical writing, I found myself at The Graduate Musical Theatre Writing Program at NYU Tisch.

My two years at GMTWP were the most incredibly butt kicking years of my life, where I learned how to put language to the writing ideas I had formed as an actor. From songs about giant goats made of hay, to my thesis musical about grief, I worked with brilliant lyricists and learned to shape material in my own voice. Mentored by the likes of Mindi Dickstein (Little Women), Steven Lutvak (A Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder), and William Finn (…Spelling Bee, Falsettos), I learned how to structure the passion I’d had as an actor into my own cohesive stories. 

My grandmother couldn’t know that that one performance of Peter Pan would send me off on my own flight, but I am ever so grateful that she took me. Be it on stage or with my pen in hand, my goal will always be to give those actors more to do and say—to “make them come back.”

When I’m not pouring my brain into theater I love a good book–I’m currently obsessed with Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow and Water for Elephants. I’m an avid listener to Las Culturistas, and I have recently become involved and then ingrained in The New York CIty Gay Men’s Chorus, where I am also in the a cappella group Tonewall, and serve as the Assistant Staging Director.