St. Pete is celebrated for its fabulous weather, beautiful vistas, world-class food scene, and thriving cultural atmosphere but the people of St. Pete truly make this city something special. In appreciation, each month Green Bench shines a light on one of the many people that make St. Pete unique.
This month we’re placing local theater director and art educator Tiffany Ford in the limelight. Ford is passionate about using the power of artistic expression to “empower people to connect, collaborate, and achieve more together.”
From Whitney to Belle and Beyond: Finding Her Heart’s Desire
A native Floridian, Ford grew up in Palm Beach Gardens as the youngest child of a stained-glass artist/art director and a professional golfer. With artists and athletes as role models, she might have envisioned herself as a painter or perhaps a Master’s champion like her grandfather Douglas Ford. Young Ford saw a different future: She’d be the next Whitney Houston! That 8-year-old girl’s dream guided her path for years. She performed in secondary-school chorus and musical productions, entered the musical theater program at the University of Central Florida (UCF), and even spent a summer playing “Belle” at Disneyland. She enjoyed the stage, but soon realized that the founding of UCF’s student-run production company, Project Spotlight, manifested her true heart’s desire: “working collaboratively with a group of people to create a new thing.” After earning her bachelor’s degree in arts and theater with a minor in philosophy, she allowed that realization to guide her choices.
The Power of Art
A national nomination in directing for the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival brought Ford to Washington, where she spent eight years teaching and directing. She also found time to co-create and lead the Wobble Rocket Stage. This youth improvisational theater trains students in collaborative performance, and her involvement reinforced her desire to expand her involvement with “devised theater.” This process in which a whole creative team develops a show collaboratively is central to her understanding of the power of art. “Experiencing and creating art breaks barriers and builds connections within people and between people,” she said. Wanting to center this process in her work, she grabbed the opportunity to move to St. Pete in 2013 and became the education specialist at Sarasota’s Asolo Repertory Theatre. Of the many devised theater pieces she collaborated on while there, she is proudest of the collection of local immigration stories called “Faces of Change: Growing America” which connected people and broke barriers both on stage and off stage. The experience reinforced the idea that theater could be a powerful tool for social change. In 2015, she took that transformative energy to American Stage Theater where she served as the director of education and outreach and the director of Improv for seven years.
Crossroads and New Challenges
During her tenure at American Stage, Ford focused on bringing arts and the community together with a variety of initiatives that included school tours, improv programs, and corporate training. Earlier this year, she decided it was time to pursue new ways to engage with the community through the arts. Taking advantage of this career crossroads, she continues her exploration of collaborative work centered on access and inclusion, including working with the St. Petersburg Arts Alliance and taking the lead in the creation of the Sunshine City Improv Theatre. Ford cares about the impact that the arts can have in a community and she is excited about the collaborative possibilities the future will bring.
