The USC School of Dramatic Arts announced today that Professor Emeritus Robert R. Scales, Ph.D., designer, technical director, USITT fellow, and former dean of the School, passed away on Friday, May 24, 2019.
A dean and a professor at USC from 1993-2003, he also taught at Yale University, University of Minnesota, University of Washington, Hardin-Simmons University, Banff School of the Arts, and University of Missouri at Kansas City.
Working in technical production and lighting design, Dr. Scales held positions at various theatres, including Theatre Projects Consultants, Seattle Repertory Theatre, Kansas City Repertory Theatre, Stratford Festival Theatre of Canada, and Guthrie Theatre. He served on the Boards of the 24th Street Theater, Starlight Theater in San Diego, and LA Stage Alliance.
He retired from USC in 2003 and served as the Emeriti College Director, volunteer Associate Director for the Emeriti Center, and a leader on the Emeriti Center’s executive committee. USC presented him with the Paul E. Hadley Faculty Award for Service to USC in 2015.
Members of the industry offer their memories of the beloved Dr. Scales:
"The consummate theatre production professional and everything you could ever want in a friend and colleague has left us for a new venue. Technical director, designer, problem solver, organizer, manager, professor, dean, theatre consultant, Bob Scales was always kind, ever generous, curious, giving, and concerned.
He brought out the best in any production—no matter the budget or the venue, Bob designed and brought to life better theatres for people on both sides of the curtain. He nurtured talents and helped create careers. He made every colleague and collaborator’s work better, brighter, and more thoughtful.
With Bob on the team every production meeting was illuminated by the crackling sparkle of his mind at work— devising yet another way to solve the challenge.
Look forward to more spectacular heavenly displays now that Bob is organizing the Scene Shop in the Sky, tinkering with the Silent Door Closure, checking the Spring in the floors, and finding a new and better uses for that illusive-but much needed widget: the Sky Hook.
The Ghost Light now burns for Bob Scales."
— Pat MacKay, LDI Founder and USITT Fellow
"Bob was the epitome of a theatre professional and such a kind way of getting to that excellence."
— Richard Durst, President Emeritus, Baldwin Wallace University; past President USITT; USITT Fellow
"Bob Scales’ passing marks a life with an indelible imprint of a true professional and gentleman. I had the privilege of knowing Bob as a colleague and friend. As one who was fortunate of having worked closely with Bob, his strength and talent could only be bettered by his smile. We worked together during my last season as lighting designer at the Guthrie (1968) where he was the Technical Director and we collaborated on the first expansion of the original building. He maintained his role there and managed to implement the renovation as planned. Later he was the Technical Director at the Seattle Repertory Theatre where we consulted on the Bagley Wright Theatre. It was such a pleasure to share ideas and see them come to fruition. As a leader in technical production, lighting design, consulting and education he was a mentor to many young professionals and became known to so many with his commitment to USITT. Bob is truly missed but well remembered."
— S. Leonard Auerbach, FASTC, IALD, USITT Fellow, Founder - Director of Design of Auerbach Pollock Friedlander
From the late 1960’s in Minneapolis, Bob Scales and I shared many moments and dreams. In the scene shop at the old Guthrie Theater he and Jim Bakkum and I reveled in many theatrical follies, including the first vacu-form machine. This all came back to focus when at the USITT Convention in Fort Worth, Texas, the three of us regaled again over such events.
In subsequent years, when chair of various theatre departments, we visited Stratford Canada, Bob always took time to greet and talk with students. They rarely realized that they were talking to a legend. Bob was consistently a gentle, giving man and he never forgot those experiences from which only a few of us can even begin to recall. I count it as a significant occasion to recall his memory in my considerable classical theatre career.
— Dr. Lou Campbell, Director, the First International Mime Institute and Festival, 1974
Please feel free to send your thoughts about Dr. Scales to [email protected] so we can add to this tribute.