Teacher leaves the stage School: Paul Tines, who will leave St. Paul's soon for a job in Connecticut, has brought dazzling productions, energy and enthusiasm to the Brooklandville campus' theater program.

Paul Tines will be remembered for many things at the St.

Paul's schools.

For a Peter Pan that appeared to really fly.

For moving dramas on AIDS and date rape.

For Shakespeare in the garden with fireworks and flaming torches.

But more than for dazzling performances, Tines will be remembered for making theater "awesome," "cool," a thing to do the Brooklandville prep school campuses.

"More and more athletes come to auditions. We had the captain of the football team in one show. That was unheard of, unheard of," Tines said as he prepared for his last St. Paul's production, this weekend's run of "A Midsummer Night's Dream."

After five years, he is bowing out as director of the Ward Center for the Arts, a $6 million theater complex shared by the adjacent St. Paul's School and St. Paul's School for Girls. In July, Tines will become director of the Paul Mellon Arts Center at Choate Rosemary Hall, a boarding and day school in Wallingford, Conn.

"When I first arrived [at St. Paul's], we had a few [Ward] Center kids, and the rest said, 'Why did they build an arts center? Why didn't they build a gym?' " said Tines, who taught at Choate for 11 years before coming to St. Paul's.

Tines, 44, hooked the students through his endless energy for them and his work, and through his enthusiasm, professionalism, creativity and choice of shows.

"People come and see the shows and they are a lot of fun, and they see the actors having fun. Now, people are sneaking in and sitting on the steps," said Liz Kenderdine, a senior who plays Puck in the Shakespearean comedy that continues tonight and tomorrow night.

Pebble Kranz, who works in the marketing department at Center Stage and performs there, knew Tines when she attended Choate. "Being in a Paul Tines production at Choate was better )) than being on Broadway. He really inspired us."

Tines hopes that in helping students appreciate theater, he lets them see more of life.

Dramas on the Holocaust, acquired immune deficiency syndrome and date rape showed middle and high school students that the arts spoke their language, he said. Once they were coming to the theater, he said, he could "sneak in 'Our Town,' " a more traditional play, and bow out with a Shakespearean production.

Outdoor production

Even his last show, however, is a first.

Weather permitting, "A Midsummer Night's Dream" is being performed in a garden down the hill from the boys' upper school. As thousands of lights twinkle in the trees and torches blaze behind the stage, actors emerge from blooming azalea bushes and scale a small stone wall near what was once the pool house.

"Actors, let's go, let's go. We've got a lot to do, an awful lot to do," Tines called out during a recent rehearsal. And then the energy explodes.

One second he hunches over in conversation with the costume director, then he's down the hill, pausing at center stage, fists on his hips, watching. On stage, he moves one actor's arm, another's hand. Then, he is up the hillside, calling, "Project, project. Vocalize, guys. It's not a mime show.

"Use your arms more, Jay.

"Quickly, move, move," he calls to the young men sauntering off the stage.

'Like professionals'

"He doesn't treat them like high school kids; he treats them like professionals," said St. Paul's chaplain, the Rev. Donald Roberts, who has assisted with many productions. On this day, he is minding the baby goat that waits to play its part.

"When we're in rehearsal, he's just everywhere all at once. You always have to be alert," said senior Ben Roman. "He's taught me to persist even when it seems so difficult."

Besides being a teacher, director and advocate for the arts, Tines has managed the arts center and "taught the faculty and staff how to utilize a professional-quality space," said Lynda-Marie Allen, the girls' school French teacher, who is a woodland fairy in the current production.

Tines also brought together the arts departments of the schools, designed a ninth-grade arts foundation course that will begin this fall for boys and girls, and gave the school its burgeoning reputation for first-class productions.

"He's been dazzling," said Robert Hallett, headmaster of the boys' school. "He's given the kids confidence, a sense of presence. The kids want to rise to his standards."

Offstage as well as on.

"I've never, ever seen him angry at a student," said Ben Roman, who is in his fifth Tines production. "He's taught me, by example, to be ever aware of other people."

That, Tines said, pleases him more than the accolades that roll in after every production.

"I do believe that I can make a difference," he said. "I love kids. This is what I'm best at.

Pub Date: 5/16/97