At 17, Kelley Weber began volunteering at schools in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, teaching theater and helping students tell their stories. She has been teaching in one form or another since, eventually finding her place as a theater director.
In 1999, a decade later and 1,000 miles West, Weber came to Clayton. Before the school year began, Weber met with senior Ellie Schwetye, the then-president of the thespian club. Over a diner breakfast, the two discussed their vision for the program’s future. This meeting kicked off a life-long friendship, and in 2019, Schwetye was hired as the high school’s assistant theater director.
This February, after Weber announced her retirement, Schwetye assisted in organizing a retirement party alongside Production Manager Stephanie Kirk. The party involved various musical numbers performed by past and present students. Weber anticipated that former students who live in town would be in attendance, but she was shocked when alumni from all over the country surprised her.
“[It] was incredibly special; I had students who flew back from New York just to sing a song for a night for me. I was so proud of them,” Weber said. “They wouldn’t do that for just any teacher. I said afterward, ‘Man, I wish everybody got musically serenaded into their retirement,’ because it was pretty great.”
Over her 25-year Clayton career, Weber directed over 50 productions from Shakespeare to Sweeney Todd. In 2007, with the help of Nick Otten, an English teacher at the time, Weber wrote an original play for her students based on the true story of Rev. Carl Kabat, who protested nuclear weapons by breaking into missile silos dressed as a clown and attempting to disarm the weapons. Weber’s play, “And Carl Laughed,” was selected by the American High School Theater Festival to be performed at the “Edinburgh Festival Fringe” the following summer.
“That was probably the best project I’d worked on, [and] that I’ve worked on my whole 25 years here. It was awesome!” Weber said. “I could talk about that show forever because it was truly meaningful for the kids involved.”
She also wrote “Dinosaurs” after the Michael Brown shooting for “Every 28 Hours Play.” Weber plans to write more plays in retirement and is currently enrolled in a master’s program at Earlham College.
“I’m interested in telling stories that help us to look at the way we’re doing things and to invite people to ask: ‘Is this the best that we can do?’” Weber said.
Weber has helped countless students along their theater journeys and beyond. Some have ended up in top-ranked graduate programs for acting at schools such as NYU, Juilliard and Yale. Others have become successful Broadway actors, production managers and even one Emmy-winning sports anchor. Weber’s successor, Mallory Duncan, is a former student, and like many of her other students, she greatly impacted her career.
“My senior year was the first year the student-run musical was produced using an already written show. We did ‘You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown.’ Afterward, Mrs. Weber told me I might have a future as a director,” Duncan said. “As someone who was always an actor, I had never considered that option. It lit a spark in me, and I’ve directed ever since.”
This realization would not have been possible for Duncan without the opportunity Weber provided. While Weber’s impact has been transformative, she acknowledges the reciprocal nature of learning, emphasizing that she has learned as much from her students as they have from her.
“They’ve taught me to stay close to the source of where we start loving what we love. Sometimes, the more you learn your craft, the more critical you get and the more cynical you get,” Weber said. “By teaching young people, they have given me the gift of staying close to the excitement of learning something for the first time and staying green. I still love making a show and telling a story.”
