Allan Carlsen (1943-2025)
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Allan Carlsen, Broadway actor, director, co-founder of University of Delaware’s Healthcare Theatre and founding member of lynchpin Chicago storefront theaters Chicago City Players (CCP) and Kingston Mines Theater, died at the age of 82. Allan was a talented actor, director and educator with a lifelong commitment to making theater and creating opportunities for theater professionals. His work establishing Healthcare Theatre, an interdisciplinary program between the University’s College of Health Sciences and the College of Arts and Sciences, was designed to develop communication skills for healthcare professionals through staged interactive scenarios, and grew into a powerful employment option for theater professionals, utilizing their training and theater skills.
After college at the University of Delaware, Allan eschewed his degree in electrical engineering to return to Chicago to pursue his interest in making theater. As a member of CCP, Allan played a part in creating one of Chicago’s earliest storefront Off-Loop theaters; CCP was based in the Wellington Avenue United Church of Christ (which later became home for TimeLine Theatre Company for many years). In 1969, the CCP folks founded Kingston Mines Theater as a professional company in an old trolley barn on Lincoln Avenue, naming the theater after company member Jack Wallace's Illinois hometown, a mining community. They later opened a cafe to help generate revenue, and while the theater company eventually disbanded and the space took on new management, their business model of food and drink underwriting entertainment expenses continued as the world-famous blues nightclub Kingston Mines. Chicago theater credits from that time include: AMERICA HURRAH! (CCP, 1968), THE SERPENT (Kingston Mines, 1969), THE PEOPLE VS. RANCHMAN (Director, Kingston Mines Theater, 1970), THE ASSAULT UPON CHARLES SUMNER (Kingston Mines Theater, 1970), SUDDENLY LAST SUMMER (Ivanhoe Theater, 1973), and ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEXT (11th Street Theater, 1973). Allan’s theater work in Chicago became the launchpad for his move to Broadway. In 1973, he was cast in a breakout role in Goodman Theater’s National Premier of FREEDOM OF THE CITY, which then moved to New York the following year (Alvin Theater, 1974). Over the course of 17 years, he starred in and directed countless New York City productions. His most celebrated and signature role was that of Billy Bishop in BILLY BISHOP GOES TO WAR, a demanding one-man showcase. In 2001, Allan joined the Theatre Department faculty of the University of Delaware (now the Department of Theatre and Dance), with a resume that included directing and acting credits both on and off-Broadway, as well as regional theatre and television throughout the United States and Canada. In 2009 as part of the University, he co-founded Healthcare Theatre and became its Director. The program trained theater students to portray patients and family members in live standardized healthcare encounters, in order to better prepare clinicians for a highly realistic, but safe, experience to empower all participants to grow both personally and professionally. In a 2023 College of Health Sciences article about Healthcare Theatre, Professor Carlsen called the program ‘’unique and transformative.” He said, “It’s changing the way future and current health care providers are trained to enhance their medical and communication skills by providing an effective approach in learning how to interact in a healthcare environment.” Despite his demanding role at the University, Allan stayed true to his Chicago grassroots theater origins by becoming a pillar of the local Delaware performing arts community. He collaborated on numerous productions, musicals, dance performances and church events and was actively involved with the University of Delaware’s Resident Ensemble Players and Chapel Street Players. Colleagues said this about Allan: “Allan could transform anything and any space into a theatre and that is exactly what we did when we built the simulation spaces into a black box theatre (as Allan called it). Walls were covered with flat screens, and the space could be converted into any kind of environment: a hospital waiting room, a recovery room filled with patient actors or a street corner where an accident has just occurred. All that was left was to bring in the props.” “Standardized patients are commonly used to help train healthcare professionals in medical schools. But Healthcare Theatre created simulations that were unique, absolutely not standardized, and it is improvisation at its best, where the intensity of the simulation is adjusted to the skill of the learner. This method is targeted to train medical students for the challenges that they will face in the future, but we also use this method to do training for multiple disciplines, including: nursing, physical therapy, speech therapy, behavioral health, nutrition and health coaching.” Allan is survived by his wife of 33 years, Lisa Papili-Carlsen; his children and their spouses, Olivia and Bryan Bryde, Andrea and Matt Taylor, and Allan Einar Carlsen; his grandchildren, Gillian and Mila Bryde, and Luke and Emma Taylor; as well as many relatives and extended family. Contributions in Professor Carlsen’s memory may be made to Healthcare Theatre. Gifts can be made on the University of Delaware’s secure website, www.udel.edu/makeagift. Select “I’d like to search for a different option” (found under the continue button) and search for “Healthcare Theatre Gifts” to donate. Contributions can alternatively be sent to: University of Delaware, Gifts Processing, 83 East Main St., 3rd Floor, Newark, DE 19716. Please make checks payable to “University of Delaware” and include on the memo line “In memory of Professor Allan E. Carlsen.” |