Brian Chamberlain Photo By Carol McCracken
Brian Chamberlain remembers when he decided that he wanted to be a professional actor. He was in his 20’s and he’d worked as a production scheduler in the manufacturing field for too long. He wasn’t one bit happy doing that because there wasn’t anything creative about the job at all. His uncle asked him once – “If there were no money in the world, what would you do?”
“I’d be an actor,” he said with no hesitation. With a new goal, his life took a dramatic turn. He studied with the Second City, an improv organization. It’s where many of the “Saturday Night Life” actors study, Brian said. In high school, he’d acted in numerous plays so it wasn’t a suprising career move for those who knew him well.
Nimbleness of mind and body is the hallmark of the play in which Brian currently co-stars at the Hill’s Good Theater. He slips easily into numerous roles with a turn of the head or out of roles with a turn of his body. And that’s very good because the talented Brian plays numerous roles (20 I think?) with no costume changes – it relies on his voice, attitude and physical changes to become another memorable character in the funny and poignant “Stones In His Pockets.” The plot revolves around a high-end movie company filming in a small Irish village and the complications that arise from that endeavor. The other co-star is Chris Reiling. “Stones In His Pockets” runs through Sunday, November 23rd. www.goodtheater.com Highly recommended by MHN.
Brian lives with his wife, Amy, and their German shephard, Apollo, in a cabin in the White Mounains of New Hampshire. He says their life is very simple right now but if his careers continues to grow as it has this past year or so, the couple may be obliged to move closer to where his works takes him – Portland, Boothbay Harbor, Portsmouth, NH etc. His work keeps the couple apart for long stretches at a time – a situation he’d like to remedy. Brian has played in a number of productions under the direction of Brian Allen including “Shakespeare in Hollywood” and “Prelude to a Kiss” at the Good Theater. Amy is in charge of events for the Mt. Washington Auto Road in NH.
Theater audiences should be grateful to Brian’s uncle for discovering this sooo talented and sooo unpretentious actor who is a delight to watch in every sense of the word!