At age 12, John Ruffin knew what he wanted to do for the rest of his life.
“I was a student at Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School in Harvey where we lived,” Ruffin recalls. “I saw a production of ‘The King and I,’ and I was captivated.”
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That was all it took.
Whether it was the music, the acting, the scenery or the stagecraft, young John Ruffin was fascinated. The kid who was too shy to be on the school’s speech team knew what he was going to do the rest of his life.
The theater in all its aspects was his starting point.
“It was as if God had carved it into stone for me,” Ruffin says.
At Thornton Township High School, Ruffin says he gained enough experience by writing and producing his plays as well as taking the lead role. Well, why not?
Throughout the intervening years, he honed his craft, working with churches and stages in the area, including staging plays at the Harold Washington Cultural Center in Chicago.
Professional actors and writers came to his rehearsals. Script doctors would “red line” his words until, he says, he could “learn my own style.” Despite his hard work, Ruffin never had a stage he could call his own until 2018, when he started Theater 47 in what was a storied stage in downtown Park Forest.
Founded in 1976, the Illinois Theatre Center in downtown Park Forest was under the direction of Steve and Etel Billig. But with the death of co-founder Etel Billig in 2012, the theater was forced to close. It was opened again at the SPA Theater, and it took six years before it re-opened under Ruffin’s leadership.
His first production, “Black Nativity,” was a sold-out success, and through the years he added more performances of each play.
In recent years, Ruffin’s productions included biographical tributes to both Phyllis Hyman and Teddy Prendergrass. He will open the 2026-2027 season with a tribute to Ike Turner with “Taking Back My Name.”
Ruffin’s 200-seat theater is usually sold out for all performances, so he schedules as many as 18 to 22 performances in an effort to satisfy his audiences.
This commitment to the south suburbs is one of the reasons the village of Park Forest last week honored Ruffin for his work with a proclamation as the village’s Business Person of the Year.
Wet letter
To whom it may concern:
Thank you for the recent rainstorms.
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I cannot remember the last time I watered the lawn, thus keeping me from taking out a loan when the water bill comes due.
Our back-of-the-garage garden is flourishing. We tasted our first ripe tomato this week and a fat green zucchini on our kitchen counter is awaiting its date with a sharp knife. It must have been the water.
Rain helps us add to the local economy as Jake, who cuts our grass, knows he can count on us for a steady portion of his weekly income.
Our multihued collection of plants and flowers in our front yard never looked better, although some of the taller varieties are on our to-do cut list. We’ll get to them soon. Maybe.
That being noted, we humbly ask, for just a little while, if you please, pretty please, turn off the faucet. Enough is enough.
Last Thursday, we were driving back from Crete, when we encountered a small monsoon and hailstorm trying to navigate Steger Road. Car flashers were blazing away as we were able to slowly pilot our way through the deluge. But when we told our friends in Homewood about our experience, to a person they insisted we were wrong.
“We had no rain,” they said. “Are you sure?” they asked. “How many did you have?” they hinted.
Anything you can do to help me erase a now sullied reputation, please do, if you please.
Then let’s talk about the heat.
Jerry Shnay is a freelance columnist for the Daily Southtown.