merelyplayers.org - Alan Velotta

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The Players

Alan Velotta
President / Founding Artistic Director

Owensboro native Alan Velotta's passion for the arts began as a child when he first experienced the magic of community theatre. By the age of 15, he was the youngest actor to become a member of Horse Cave Theatre's apprentice company where he earned membership candidacy in Actors' Equity. Alan studied musical theatre at the prestigious American Musical and Dramatic Academy in NYC and has worked professionally in many theatres throughout the US, affording him a few blessed opportunities to work with such celebrated "theatre people" as Phyllis Diller, Stephen Sondheim and The Amazing Kreskin.

Alan's regional credits include: Kentucky Repertory Theatre (formerly Horse Cave Theatre), Actors Theatre of Louisville and Actors Guild of Lexington where he won a Raymond A. Smith "Excellence in Theatre" award. Alan is a member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), the American Association of Community Theatre (AACT), the Kentucky Theatre Association (KTA), and the Southeastern Theatre Conference (SETC), and is a featured "Kentuckian in Theatre" on KET's Drama Toolkit. He served as an adjudicator for the Community Theatre Division of the Kentucky Theatre Association's Annual AACTFest in 2006 and received KTA's "Excellence in Direction" award for OPEN 24 HOURS in 2007. Alan was honored to receive SETC's "Excellence in Acting" and "Outstanding Original Music" awards for OPEN 24 HOURS at the 59th Annual Conference in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

As founding artistic director of Merely Players, Alan is committed to producing contemporary plays and musicals in non-traditional venues while providing essential outlets for both the experimental thespian and the adventurous theatergoer.

"So many talents, gathered en masse! Painters and poets, artists and dreamers, watered like grass. And if the talent I have is for nurturing talent, then succeed or fail, I will see they sail first-class." —Stephen Sondheim