An Arizona theater company is giving military veterans a new kind of mission: stepping onto the stage in an uncharacteristic way.
The Silent Survivors Project and its producing arm, Arizona Frontline Theater, were built around a simple idea — that performance can help veterans process their experiences while educating audiences about the realities of service and its aftermath.
Founder Michael Maisano, a Marine Corps infantry veteran who later served in the Arizona Army National Guard, said the work combines his military background with his training in psychology.
“With this process, the actors, the everybody involved gets to be creative again,” Maisano said. “Stories just naturally come out as you feel relaxed and build a camaraderie.”
Maisano served four years in the Marine Corps after high school, including time in security forces, before a break in service. After the Sept. 11 attacks and the death of Army Ranger Pat Tillman, he returned in uniform through the Arizona Army National Guard, deploying to Iraq as a military police officer from 2006 to 2007.
A knee injury during training forced him to rethink his future. Graduate school and a doctoral program in psychology led him to work with veterans in a different way — eventually on stage.
The nonprofit’s name, Silent Survivors Project, is inspired by actor and World War II veteran Eddie Albert, who once rejected the “hero” label, saying the real heroes were the ones who didn’t come home. Maisano said many veterans feel the same way and rarely talk about their service outside trusted circles.
“Theater becomes our way of fundraising, telling stories and engaging veterans,” he said. “Hopefully we’ll get to the point where we’re 100% production crew and actors, everybody are veterans, but it’s a process.”
For actors like Greg Lutz, that process feels familiar.
Lutz spent 12 years in the Navy, starting aboard the ballistic missile submarine USS George Washington Carver before becoming a hospital corpsman and attaching to the Marine Corps as a medic. After leaving the service, he drove to Los Angeles and landed roles on television series including Knots Landing, Beverly Hills, 90210 and The Wonder Years.
Now, he’s part of a veteran theater troupe that draws on the same sense of purpose he felt in uniform.
“There's great camaraderie in the acting community, especially in the theater,” Lutz said. “It's a lot like a mission. You get cast. You find out you're the best for that job, and so it's kind of like being back in the military, but you're enjoying yourself more.”
As a veteran, Lutz said he can bring an authenticity to stories about military life that audiences immediately recognize.
“As a veteran, I can instantly step into that and relate to it, understand, and I think project it in a positive manner, even if it's a negative story a little bit,” he said. “There's always a positive.”
Marine Corps veteran Ia Feraren came to the stage from a very different path.
She served from 2011 to 2015, driving a wrecker as part of a motor transport unit in Okinawa. Like many service members, she said leaving the Corps meant losing the built-in support system of her unit.
“You just get used to like being with your guys, you know, and then transitioning over, you lose that camaraderie,” Feraren said. “I suppose you're alone again in this big world. No one's telling you what to do… So, I went back to school… that was kind of a hard time because you know you see a lot of people struggling, and that didn't really work for me.”
A tarot reader suggested acting as a way to channel what she was feeling. One class led to another, and eventually to Arizona Frontline Theater.
“It's a combination of what I love, you know, the military and this new thing I found, like this art form that's opening me up to the world,” she said. “So I feel very honored to be a part of this.”
The company stages productions that range from military-focused dramas to broader stories with strong character arcs. Past work has included “Medal of Honor Rag,” a two-person play based on a Medal of Honor recipient in a therapy session, and upcoming shows like “Adopt a Sailor,” about a young sailor whose visit with an upper-class New York couple changes all three of them.
Maisano said the goal is to entertain, educate and foster understanding — for civilians trying to grasp what service members carry home, and for veterans who may not be ready for traditional talk therapy.
He compares the rehearsal room to a kind of informal group therapy, where veterans from different branches discover how much they have in common.
“We have veterans from all branches, almost all branches, and they may never have served with another service,” he said. “They get to hear, ‘Oh, your story is just like our story of being late for muster… we thought it was only happening to us.’ It’s almost like group therapy. It’s funny”
For veterans who are hesitant to step into the spotlight, Maisano stresses that there is room for everyone — on stage, backstage or in the audience.
“The door is always open. We're constantly recruiting,” he said. “If you have an enjoyment, this is a place where you can be around like-minded. We give priority to veterans for that.”
From the wings to the front row, Arizona Frontline Theater is building a space where veterans can reclaim their voices — sometimes as characters, sometimes as themselves — and where the stories that were once kept quiet can finally be heard.
Upcoming performances of the ‘Class’ are scheduled for August 13th, 14th, and 15th and Arts HQ Gallery in Surprise.
You can find more information on the Silent Survivors Project and Frontline Theatre by visiting their website.
Learn more about the Arts HQ Gallery by visiting.
