Okay... not really.
Congrats, Ryan!
Story
Big question stops the show at Clark Center
Follies actor asks girlfriend in audience to marry him
By Steve Fairchild / Staff Writer / sfairchild@timespressrecorder.com
Ryan Loyd had no idea he was going to be making history Saturday night when he became the first person ever to make a proposal for marriage at the Clark Center for the Performing Arts in Arroyo Grande.
Loyd, the box office supervisor of the Clark Center for two years, was playing a role in the Central Coast Follies latest show, “Let’s Misbehave,” which just finished up a four-night run Sunday.
It was the first time Loyd had been on stage in 10 years. He chose to perform in the show after watching it last year and seeing how much fun the actors were having in their yearly fund-raiser for Parkinson’s disease research.
An Arroyo Grande resident, Lloyd decided to make it a performance his girlfriend, Anna Levine of Morro Bay, will never forget.
Before Saturday’s show, he purposely sat his girlfriend close to two actors who were planted in the audience as part of the show so that when he popped the big question, his lighting man would be able to get her in the spotlight.
Then, right before the final song of the play, and with his microphone on for the entire house to hear, he walked over to his girlfriend and asked her to marry him.
“I had it going through my mind all day,” Loyd said of the moment he walked down the stage stairs and over to her seat. “I asked the audience if their loves had ever come all together at a single point. I mean, I love my music. I love my job. I love my family and friends. And then I said, ‘Anna Banana Baby, will you be my wife?’
“She nodded, and then I asked her if I could go finish the play.
“At first, the audience thought it was a part of the show,” Loyd added. “Then the noise level began to increase. When we did the curtain call, there was more cheering.”
The show’s producer, Bernie Kautz, said several people asked her if Loyd would be performing the proposal at the next show, but she assured them it was a one-time thing, he said.
To make Loyd’s proposal story even sweeter, Levine’s mom and Loyd’s parents were both in the audience for the show. Levine was wearing a tennis bracelet that had belonged to her grandmother who suffered from Shy-Drager syndrome, which has symptoms very similar to Parkinson’s disease. In addition, Loyd’s mom was wearing a locket that had pictures of his grandparents in it.
Loyd said he asked director Jason Sumabat if he could ask the show-stopping question. Sumabat explained that he liked the idea and it had happened before in the business, but nobody had ever asked him for permission.
The happily engaged couple plan to get married a year from now somewhere on the Central Coast.
October 14, 2005
