James Porter and Jim Coates met in 2007. At the time, the two actors were working with the Southwest Shakespeare Company’s educational outreach program, and Porter was not wholly satisfied with the work the organization was doing in the community.
“They never really sent enough of us actors out there to the schools,” Coates, 66, said. “(Porter) kept getting irritated and saying, ‘I could do a better job than that.’ And I said, ‘Then, well, let’s do it.’”
And with that, the idea for the Arizona Curriculum Theater Inc. was born. Since its founding in 2009, the nonprofit organization has made its mission to “use the power of the arts to promote literacy, engage students, and make education more fun and accessible,” according to its website.
The organization’s signature fundraising event since its conception has been PoeFest, a monthlong celebration of Edgar Allan Poe and his work.
“It’s our biggest fundraiser of the year, and without it, we wouldn’t be able to afford to go to Title I schools for free — schools that really need the help and can’t afford our services,” said Porter, 44, the theater’s executive director and founder. “It enables us to do what we do all year round.”
Porter said the event raised about $10,000 last year, and he is hoping to see that number grow this year. For the first time, every performance of the event will be housed at the Hotel San Carlos’ Ghost Lounge every Friday and Saturday night in October.
In addition, PoeFest 2013 will have its grand finale Halloween night at the Rosson House Museum, a gothic Victorian mansion built in 1895 and located in Heritage Square. There, every 20 minutes between 7:30 and 9:30 p.m., Porter will do a performance of Poe’s best-known piece, “The Raven.”
“This reading of ‘The Raven’ gives us the opportunity to share a unique experience with new fans and hopefully leave them wanting more from this Phoenix treasure,” said Michelle Reid, executive director of the Rosson House, in an email statement.
Five years after its launch, PoeFest has “exploded,” as Porter puts it. Arizona Curriculum Theater has upgraded from “a little black box on Grand Avenue” to a famous haunted hotel and 19th-century gothic space.
“If you gave me my choice of any two spaces in downtown Phoenix to hold this, those would be my choices,” Porter said.
PoeFest 2013 will include performances of “The Cask of Amontillado,” “The Black Cat,” “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “Mary Shelley’s Dream” by actors Jim Coates, Beau Heckman, Laurelann Porter and Danette Porter, respectively.
These performances are not exclusive to PoeFest, and Arizona Curriculum Theater takes them to needy schools throughout the state. They also share the literature of authors such as William Shakespeare and Walt Whitman.
“Creating Arizona Curriculum Theater was really about me remembering the first time an artist came and visited my school and the power of that inspiration,” James Porter said. “It liberated my education.”
Upon realizing that the inspiration and liberation he derived from theater was disappearing from schools, Porter decided to figure out a way to not only get artists into schools, but also a way to make this service affordable for the schools themselves. PoeFest, along with private donors and a volunteer administration headed by Porter, helps makes this goal possible.
“We don’t turn anybody down. If somebody wants us, we go to their school whether they can afford us or not,” Porter said.
Porter’s passion for bringing arts education to the community’s youth, especially those in underprivileged neighborhoods, stems from his troubled teenage years. He said if he did not have an arts-rich education he would be “dead or in jail.”
“(In high school) I started to go downhill as a student,” Porter said. “I dropped out of high school at one point, using a lot of drugs and alcohol and experiencing depression.”
He attributes this downward spiral to his high school’s lack of emphasis on the arts — an aspect of education that was introduced to Porter in middle school.
“It was a totally different learning environment and one that was not working for me. And there were a lot of kids like me. Those are the ones we want to reach.”
Donations are accepted, and tickets are available at the Arizona Curriculum Theater’s website.
Contact the reporter at mjbartel@asu.edu
