Alpa Dave is a longtime Freehold student, and relatively recent addition to Freehold’s Board of Directors. Alpa also took on the gargantuan task of leading the planning for Freehold’s 2026 gala: engage your invisible. We talk to Alpa about how she got involved with Freehold, her goals for the gala, and why theatre is so important right now.

Starting out, can you just talk a little bit about how you got involved with Freehold? 

Yes. So I moved to Seattle in 1996 and wanted to find a way to meet new people, and decided to join acting classes, and so I took Acting One and Acting Two at Freehold in 1997 or 1998, thereabouts. And I really enjoyed those classes, and ended up taking a bunch of other classes—Improv with Matt Smith—so, yeah, it was back then that I got involved.

You know, one of the things I realized when I was in community with others that were in classes with me, or just even the faculty, was just what a strong sense of community people felt, and how Freehold was able to create this sort of very trusting and safe space for all of us. It wasn’t what I thought acting classes would be, like “We’re gonna break you down so you perform” kind of thing. So it’s just been really neat.

 

How have your goals changed and how has the community changed over the 30 years you’ve been here?

Yeah, it’s a great question. So I ended up actually going into more improv stuff after Freehold for a long time, and then I stopped completely doing anything, and now I’m back in the acting world for the past three years. What I’ve noticed recently is just that I want those connections that you feel with people when you’re in the room and you’re connecting face to face with somebody else in a very open, vulnerable, authentic way. That is so powerful. That connects us all together. That is so important. 

That authenticity and that truth is so important in the face of all of the stuff going on with machines and AI and in the face of what’s going on with the political system and people being so against each other. So I’m just cherishing those moments of connection so much more.

 

So for the past year or so you’ve been on the board? What made you decide to join? 

I took the Meisner series with Robin and then a year ago, Robin called to see if I would want to be on the board. I had, almost right away, a sort of imposter syndrome—even before I joined. Because I’m like “Me on a board of a place like Freehold? Oh my gosh!” You know, it’s just something I didn’t think that I would do. 

But I truly believe in the mission for freehold. I think we are one of the only places in Seattle that offers classes to adults and the caliber of teachers is so great. Freehold is the only of its kind, right? And so I truly believed in the mission, and I really wanted to see Freehold succeed and stay here for the next 30 years. And any part that I can play in doing that is an honor.

 

You’re sort of the point person for the gala this year. How did that role come to be yours?

I asked Paula and Mark if I could take the lead in sort of planning it because I wanted to, but also because I know that Paula was really busy with a lot of things on her plate, and so without wanting to step on anyone’s toes, I just asked if I could. And thankfully, Paula was like: “Yes, please.” So yeah, I asked if I could, and they agreed. So here I am.

 

Have you done this kind of thing before?

No, I haven’t. As part of my day job, I do a lot of planning. So the planning is something that I enjoy, but I haven’t done any kind of event planning before.

 

Having been to other galas, when you think about Freehold’s upcoming gala in June, what are some things that you want to highlight? How do you want the attendees to experience the evening?

So I think the biggest thing for me is this idea of building community, right? And celebrating the community. And so how do we get the actors and the faculty and everyone together with people that are really theatre lovers and supporters of theatre? How do we bring them together to celebrate that level of community that I talked about earlier, that I was first so drawn to with Freehold. 

I think second for me is we do have a need to build up critical funds that we need for capital investments and investments in our programming. And so how do we do that and make sure that we’re on target? 

And the third thing is, I think there’s an opportunity for all of us to build connections with other theatres. And so, how do we build those lasting connections? 

 

Putting together a gala is a lot of work, but it is also really exciting. Is there anything else that you’d like to add about the experience?

You know, being on this board has been so fruitful and nourishing to me. Seeing how much support I’m getting from Paula, for instance, because she’s done this before, how great it is to work together with the Gala Planning Committee, and working together with Robin, who is providing that artistic direction for us. It’s been a big learning curve, but it’s also been really nourishing, because, again, it goes back to community. Having a group of people that really are participating, planning it together…has been really nice.

 

Thanks Alpa.

Thank you.