Tom Fiocchi for Athens: Glimpses of Home

Props specialist points out his love for Athens
By Jenaye Antonuccio

It started with a pile of wood behind his father’s garage.
Frustrated by an unfulfilled dream to fly planes in World War II, Tom Fiocchi decided to build a lunar module with a friend. It was 1969. He was 8.
This was the first evidence of the skill and artisanship that would eventually bring Fiocchi to Athens 11 years ago, as the props technology specialist in the School of Theater at Ohio University. Considered a master at his craft, Fiocchi says of his job, “It’s really the best job in the world. I never wake up and dread going to work.”
New plays and students each quarter are what keep him feeling like he’s still 25. “I watch the students and the lights go on in their head when they learn,” he says. “They weld something, and step back and say, ‘I just welded. I’ve got to go tell my dad.’”
Fiocchi is proud of his department, which is catching more limelight due to the Arts for Ohio program. Students can now attend any eligible School of Fine Arts play, program, or exhibit free of charge, with reduced prices for community members. Before, the expectation was for only 20 percent of the seats to be filled. Now performances are often given to a nearly full house.
Fiocchi says he never had a chance to fly a plane in a war. Instead, he helped build one. And a tank. And a baby grand piano.
An entire university-owned building is filled with props from the many plays he and his students have helped outfit. There isn’t much he wouldn’t try. As project manager overseeing the student’s work, each project is just as thrilling as if it was his own.
Many people are involved in every performance, collaborating together as a team. He says he sees his job as serving the designer of the show. He does not consider his work ‘art’. “I’m really just an artisan, serving the designer’s vision,” he says. “An artist has to have something in their head. I’m just building stuff, copying with a flourish.”
One of the first things Fiocchi tells his students about this career is that it is an alternative lifestyle.
“I tell them, ‘You’re not going to be rich. But depending on what your priorities are, you might really enjoy going to work every day. It will always be different and you get to meet really interesting people, maybe even famous people.’”
His work and acting also filter into the community. The Ohio Valley Summer Theater, based in Athens, provides opportunity for community members and the university to meet in their art.
“It is such a community,” Fiocchi says. “The lines really cross between OU and the town.” Fiocchi stunned the audience with his stellar performance as Captain Hook in last year’s OVST production of Peter Pan.
Since the late 1980s, a side business as a sword cutler has also kept him busy. No two of his custom-made stage combat swords are alike. He designs and constructs exquisite hilts for previously finished blades. His website, www.fiocchisword.net, displays his wares and philosophy in sword making. He moved his business here with him.
“I’m an Athenian,” he says. “We’ve found our family here.”
Coming from D. C., small town life grew on him quickly. “People complain of traffic on Richland (Avenue), and I just want to say, ‘You don’t even know.’”
Living in a metropolis, people tend to get lost, never getting connected. “The people you see here every day,” Fiocchi says, “whether or not you know them deeply, you still trust them. Even the total strangers I see in Athens, I still know them.” He waves to a lot of cars as they pass him on the street.
Because of the university, Fiocchi feels the town benefits from a value on education and exposure to diversity. “At my daughter’s eighth grade graduation, I was cheering for all the kids she’s gone to school with,” Fiocchi says. “The teachers,” he says, “are quality people doing quality things.”
He relishes the beauty of the area, the architecture of this town. He loves the farmers market, the emphasis on sustainability, and the option for alternative commuting on the bike path. “There’s always something brewing here,” he says. “The atlatl champion of the world lives in Athens, and I’m throwing atlatls at the Paw Paw festival. Where else can you do that?” he muses.
He ends with a memory. “I was flying home looking out the window 35,000 feet. And there was Parkersburg. I followed route 50 along and there was Athens, there was the Convo.”
He cites Bruce Springsteen’s song, My Hometown, where the father takes his child on his lap in the car, showing him their town.
“On route 50, you come around the corner in the car, and it’s like a portrait. And I can’t help but saying, ‘Hey, kids, there’s your hometown. There it is.’”