Next Generation: Joe Hiatt
The magic of the movies can have a pretty big impact on people from a young age—be it a future filmmaker, a fledgling cinematographer or an aspiring performer. That’s the bug that connected with Joe Hiatt from his teen years and has followed him into the beginning of his post-grad endeavors.
A Lincoln High School and, more recently, University of Sioux Falls (USF) graduate, Hiatt was captivated by film throughout high school and beyond, and it’s been a big part of what got him interested in theater performance.
“I was an athlete for a number of years and though that’s what I wanted to do,” he said, “but after middle school I realized sports weren’t for me. That’s really when I got into movies.”
His foray into theater began his freshman year of high school, when he joined Lincoln’s oral interp team. “I did a lot better than I was expecting to—I really excelled at it. And I loved being able to find a piece that I could really connect with and tell that story.”
The experience connected him with an actor he considers a mentor still, Sara Crosby. “She pushed me harder than anybody,” he said. “She showed me the importance of criticism. Ever since the time I spent with her, my motto has been that criticism is medicine and I should learn to love taking it. It’s about evolving as a performer, about getting better.”
Joe Hiatt (right) performs with Brady Boerema (left) in Prodigal Son at University of Sioux Falls. (Submitted Photo)
The first play Hiatt performed in was a Lincoln High production of The Elephant Man, which led him to follow a simultaneous path in the world of filmmaking.
“I was able to get in contact with a local filmmaker (Dalton Coffey), and we ended up doing a short film together and that following summer a feature film,” Hiatt said. “It’s been really cool—once this dream, this desire, developed in me, to see these opportunities fall into place.”
USF was a natural fit for Hiatt, both of his parents having attended the school, and upon connecting with the university’s Director of Theatre Joe Obermueller, he saw an opportunity to hone his craft. “I thought I could learn from him. And I wanted to learn from him.”
During his collegiate performing career, Hiatt acted in productions of Much Ado About Nothing, Into the Woods and—in a Sioux Falls Stage Award-nominated performance—Loving Arms, but Obermueller also afforded Hiatt an opportunity to stretch a different muscle—production.
“He advocates for creating your own work,” he said. “So not only was I able to participate in the seasons that are put on at USF, but I also got the opportunity to kind of create and produce my own work.”
This took the form of three off-season productions, starting with the play Red by John Logan during Hiatt’s sophomore year.
“It was really amazing how it all came together and worked out,” he said. “It was a play I’d been introduced to in a class at USF, and, after the first read, I knew I needed to be a part of this show at some point in my life. It’s a play about finding who you are as an artist.
“I feel like I was introduced to that show at the perfect time. That’s what I was trying to discover. When I feel something like that, the call in me is that I think other people need to hear the same thing.”
Hiatt collaborated with fellow students Ian Doyle and Alecia Martinez to bring the show to life in USF’s black-box theater, and the experience gave him a sense of feeling heard.
“It’s really interesting, because I consider myself a shy person,” he said, “and I was incredibly shy growing up, so people who knew me as a kid kind of stop in their tracks when they hear I’m a performer.”
But his innate anxiety and fear goes away the second he steps on a stage—something he hopes to continue growing and cultivating in his next phase of life. He hopes to spend the beginning part of 2021 applying to and auditioning for graduate and drama school programs.
“The way that this past school year ended, I didn’t get to say goodbye to the classroom the way I thought I was going to be able to,” Hiatt said. “And it’s made me realize how much I love learning.”
But his eventual goal is to be a working actor—whatever the medium, he simply wants to be able to tell stories that move people.
“My goal is to be in a community that tells and produces stories,” Hiatt said. “If that’s film acting, if that’s theatre, that’s great. I want a foundation in theatre, but I want both mediums to be a part of my life.
“I got a great foundation at USF—a great base—and now I’m ready for some intense training that some of my heroes whom I look up to got.”