Douglas Peruski: Mission Statement

Douglas Peruski is the co-founder and Artistic Director of The Square Peg Players, a theatre troupe based in Duluth, Georgia. He is a graduate of the University of Georgia, where he received a degree in Theatre Arts.

Douglas Peruski says he has known since he was a high school student that he wanted a career in theatre. Initially, he says, he just wanted to act. But the more exposure he had with theatre, the more his ambitions grew. 

"I knew that if I wanted to produce plays, I would want to have complete artistic control," he says. "So I started thinking about the feasibility of starting my own theatre company. At first it was just an idea, but as time when by, it seemed more and more like it was the best way to go."

At UGA, he met and became friends with Thomas Forsythe, who at the time was in the university's Theatre Arts graduate program. Douglas Peruski acted in several of the budding playwright's plays, and the two realized they had the same essential approach to theatre.

"So one night I was out with Tom and Angela," Douglas Peruski says, referring to Forsythe's wife. "We began talking, again, about a theatre company of our own. And over a few pitchers of beer, we wrote out what became our mission statement."

That Mission Statement says: "The Square Peg Players Company seeks to provide an outlet for creative theatre artists. The Company engages, inspires, entertains, and stimulates its audience with contemporary productions that illuminate our common humanity. In meeting these goals, the Square Peg Players will explore new ideas and generate dialogues on class, the social order, and economic justice."