Posted on Dec 05, 2007

New theater director is multi-talented

After a lengthy hiatus from CSUMB, Joe Cardinalli has returned to the university as interim director of the World Theater.

He brings managerial skills to the position, but he's also a designer, technical theater consultant, television field director and a musician.

His introduction to Fort Ord came during the 1960s when he played keyboard in a Monterey rock band. His band often played at Stilwell Hall, entertaining troops bound for Vietnam.

In the late '60s, he earned a degree in theater arts from San José State, then went on to a 33-year career with the city of San Jose in the department of parks, recreation and neighborhood services. Before retiring earlier this year, he was the department's deputy director, responsible for managing about 1,400 employees, a $60 million operating budget and a $500 million capital budget.

"With a degree in theater arts, I was asked to manage the children's parks and zoo when I began working for the city," he says. "I then went on to manage special events for the city." Over the years, he's managed events ranging from five to 100,000 attendees - and accumulated 35 years of theater experience.

Cardinalli was a founder of the city's Christmas in the Park - one of the largest holiday displays west of the Mississippi. It attracts about 500,000 people a month. He's also a founder of the San Jose Holiday Parade, recognized as one of the top 25 parades in the country.

He worked at CSUMB when Teledramatic Arts & Technology first started, teaching a theater production class. Nowadays, he teaches a television production class once a week at Gavilan College in Gilroy. He's been on the board of directors of El Theatro Campesino in San Juan Bautista for 10 years. He designs many of its shows, including Zoot Suit, which recently concluded a run.

"All my life I've done theater - I've never stopped. I've gone the whole circle and now I've been able to make the circle back to Monterey and work with the great staff at the World Theater."

Cardinalli recognizes the administrative and creative challenges of running the campus theater. "The key is to analyze the audiences to find out what they really want. We've already done an audience survey at the last performance and got back a third of them. Surveys will tell us if we're targeting the right people. That is, are we giving audiences what they want?

"We need community support. I've been successful at other places where we involved the community. We have to serve both the community and the university. That's the balance we need to achieve over time for the World Theater."

He sums up his goal for the World Theater in a sentence: "Smiling faces after a performance are my reward."

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