PAUL JONATHAN DAVIS

I began my professional theatrical career in 2015 when I founded a small non-profit theater company, Paraphrase Productions. Through Paraphrase, I was able to direct my first musical, Little Shop of Horrors at Paperwing Theater in Monterey, CA. That show propelled my desire to make theater my lifelong passion. In 2015 I began attending Biola University in Los Angeles, CA. While I entered Biola as a Film Major, which was my ‘more profitable’ alternative to theater, I quickly realized that I couldn’t settle for anything except theater. I quickly got involved in the theater department and switched my major before my Sophomore Year. As I worked tirelessly in the theater department at Biola, I continued to grow Paraphrase Productions during my summers. From 2015 to 2018, I worked hard to build a dedicated core team for Paraphrase, with a focus on providing as many opportunities as possible for emerging artists in the Monterey Peninsula. In the Summer of 2016. Our core team consisted of Andrew Marderian, Victoria Sanchez, and Emily Castro. From 2015 to 2018 we produced The Addams Family: A New Musical, The Glass Menagerie, Give and Take, Man of La Mancha, Pippin, Hunchback of Notre Dame, and Nice Fish.

During my undergrad at Biola University, I had the privilege of being a founding member of our school’s chapter of Alpha Psi Omega, serving as Vice President in 2017/2018 and president in 2018/2019. Biola University had a very small, technically unimpressive theater department. I graduated with four other classmates from a program that was threatened with being shut down each year. Against all odds, I was able to see that program grow during my time there. Through the incredible leadership of Zachary Bortot and a rag-tag team of like-minded theatre students, we were able to bring the theater department to a new era. I am so proud of the work that I was able to do there. In my four years I performed in An Inspector Calls, Charm of Preparedness, A Dolls House, and Boys Next Door. I was able to launch my lighting design career with The Glass Menagerie and continue designing at Biola for Complete Works, Our Town, Almost Maine, Eleemosynary, As it is in Heaven, and my personal favorite Antigone. I graduated in 2019 (right before Covid thank god!)

After graduating from Biola University, I returned to Monterey, CA to work on Paraphrase Productions full time. In the summer of 2019, I directed my most memorable and impactful production: Next to Normal. In 2019, Paraphrase Productions expanded our outreach programs, providing acting classes and theater opportunities to anyone who wanted it, we expanded our Mentorship program, providing directing and stage management opportunities to emerging artists, and produced God of Carnage, Our Town, and a diverse and inclusive production of Rogers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella. In the early parts of 2020, we produced The Complete Works of William Shakespeare… at our brand new theater space in the American Tin Cannery. Of course, you can imagine what happened next — Covid 19 hit Parpharase hard financially. What was supposed to be our biggest year, with 17 productions and exponential growth, turned into the end of Paraphrase as we currently know it. It’s impossible now to not look back with joy on the sixteen productions I was able to see produced at Paraphrase, the outreach programs and inclusion initiatives we created, and the countless memories that were made then.

In 2021, my partner Andrew, our two housemates Victoria and Jo and I all picked up and moved to New York City! Andrew was accepted into Columbia Universities Theatre Management and Producing MFA Program and the rest of us decided to tag along! I quickly worked on getting myself plugged into the industry as much as I can. I began working as an electrician for a number of educational and off- Broadway venues including: Columbia University, Juilliard, Joyce Theater, Singature Theater Co., New York Theater Company, Vineyard Theater, 59E59, and a number of others. I work a lot with John Anselmo and Dan Mullins at Cosmo Lighting as well as Desi and Rebecca McCoy-Fisher. I hope to continue expanding my network and work at other notable venues as an electrician or spot op in the near future.