My eyes were transfixed on the glowing marquee. It was massive. Red neon letters vertically read S-t-e-p-p-e-n-w-o-l-f.

“C'mon.” Mike pulled at my coat. We walked inside the theater. A slender woman in a white cardigan, her glasses slipping down her nose, sat behind the ticket window reading a book. She looked up at us.

“We're here to usher,” Mike said into the circular cut-out, the only opening in the glass between her and us.

“Name?” She put down the book and scanned the sheet before her.

“Eaton, Mike Eaton.” He pulled off his gloves one finger at a time.

Finding the line Eaton + Friend and holding it with her left index finger, she uncorked a yellow highlighter with her teeth and squeaked the illumination over our names. Taking the cap out of her mouth, but without looking up, she pointed to her right and said, “Wait over by the elevators.”

Eight people already occupied the small elevator lobby – three women, five men, all elderly, all dressed in black, some sitting on couches, some standing in semi-circles – all staring at us. I felt like an excluded guest at an exclusive party. I turned for Mike but he was gone. I spun around and spotted him down the hallway hanging up his coat. I didn't know the other ushers. Feeling uncomfortable, I busied my eyes with photographs on the walls. In each framed black-and-white photo, I identified famous past ensemble members: John Malkovich, Joan Allen, John Mahoney, Laurie Metcalf, Gary Sinise. I had seen their films and television shows but had never seen them perform on stage. In fact, I had never been to the Steppenwolf; I could not afford the tickets. When Mike suggested I help him usher the play, I dropped everything and joined him. I could not pass up the opportunity to see a Steppenwolf play for free. I stepped forward to the photo of Gary Sinise. I had heard he was one of the founding members of Steppenwolf, along with Terry Kinney and Jeff Perry. Apparently, before they became an official theater company, the trio performed in the basement of a church in Highland Park, a northern suburb of Chicago. I crept a little closer so that my breath almost fogged the glass. I stared into Sinise's sinister growl and tried to imagine that day in 1974 when Kinney, Perry, and Sinise discussed Hermann Hesse's novel Steppenwolf . Suddenly, a voice broke my reverie.

“Come with me.”

A young-looking guy holding a clipboard and wearing a headset directed us from the lobby to the main floor of the theater. There, he told us, we were to stuff the programs with flyers in preparation for the night's show. Mike had returned from the coatroom and already had an armload of programs and a bundle of fliers. I followed him and the other ushers to the front of the stage where there was more room to spread out.

At first I wasn't impressed with the interior of the main floor. The five hundred seats were plain – no flash, no zip, no ornate carving or sconces or chandeliers – just gray dull walls and a dozen dim lights. But the lack of design was also a lack of distraction, and I wondered if the intention of the designer was to tone down the background to emphasize the performance on stage.

After a few minutes of silent stuffing, one of the male ushers asked the open-ended-not-directed-to-anyone-in-particular-so-we-can-get-a-conversation-going question: “Has anyone seen any good plays lately?” And so it began.

“You know what impressed me about Victory Gardens…”

“I don't know about that …”

“Did you see up in Skokie …”

“Really? Because I thought …”

“Oh, it was wonderful, wonderful, oh just wonderful, wonderful …”

The last man to speak, Mr. Wonderful, then looked in my direction.

“You see anything good lately?”

“Me? Uh, I don't really …”

I really felt uncomfortable. Yes, I loved theater, but I was not a theatergoer. Most weekends I either rented or attended movies out of convenience. However, I wanted to see more plays. My parents have owned season tickets to the Goodman Theatre for the past thirty years. They make it a priority to see live theater.

I tried to imitate. In college, I once took an elective called “Theater in Chicago.” Every week the class would attend a different play at a different theater. After the term ended, I kept theater a priority for one more week, seeing a play on my own, before returning my wallet to the film industry.

Luckily, I remembered a week before ushering Steppenwolf, Mike dragged me to a play in Rogers Park.

“… wait, oh yeah, The Elephant Man , up on Jarvis, pretty good, surprising nudity, but pretty good.”

The old man cocked his head slightly to the right then coughed out a laugh before composing himself. “Ha, nudity huh? I'm gonna have to check that out.”

I hesitantly smiled back. I wondered if I just bonded with a 75-year-old man over nudity. I think I did.

Just then the man with the headset and clipboard entered the main floor of the theater and waved for us to meet him in the lobby. We gathered our finished programs and placed them in the boxes by the door. Out in the lobby, the man with the headset and clipboard directed the experienced ushers to their posts and Mike and me to the balcony. Mike would take the left; I would take the right. But to my surprise, there was someone already there. Mr. Wonderful.

“You working with me?” the old usher asked me.

I smiled.

“I'll rip tickets. You hand out the programs.”

I nodded.

The crowds were gathering downstairs. We could hear them. Mr. Wonderful and I walked down to the edge of the balcony and stared out into the darkened stage.

“How long you been doing this for?” I asked my partner.

“Going on 11 years.”

Turns out, Mr. Wonderful was a retired school teacher who, after 33 years of service at Morton East High School, ushers plays seven days a week all over Chicago with his wife.

“Theater gets expensive, especially the good ones,” he said. “You can't beat this. Set-up, clean-up, free theater in between? Can't beat that.”

I agreed. This guy had his priorities right.

And with that, the houselights came on. That was our cue. Mr. Wonderful almost knocked me over as he clambered back up the stairs. I tried to keep up. We opened the right balcony doors and kicked down the doorstoppers. The people were coming up the stairs. I stood back, ready with my programs, and watched Mr. Wonderful work the door.

“Hello (take ticket). You'll be sitting in section BB (tear ticket), seats number five and six (point in general direction) .”

He treated everyone equally. Only the section and seat number changed. It was clear that most of the theatergoers were season ticket holders and knew exactly where they sat. Still, they were patient with him.

Eventually, the rush of people died down and so did the lights. We unlatched the doors and let them quietly close behind us.

“Let's take a seat,” Mr. Wonderful whispered. I followed him to the front row of the balcony were there were two empty seats. I looked at Mr. Wonderful to thank him, but he was already staring at the darkened stage, hands folded, a placid smile growing on his face.