Marking 30 years as artistic and technical director at the Fountain Hills Theater, Peter J. Hill revisits his extraordinary journey to the live stage which began around the time when Hill found bullet holes in his front door.

“I did a lot of illegal things,” he said, “I’m not real proud about who I was at that time.”

As a junior attending Glendale’s Apollo High School, Hill recalls an oral interpretation assignment from his English teacher in which every student was required to present a poem to the rest of the class.

“Yeah, right,” Hill echoed his young petulance. “I went and found the filthiest poem I could find, filled with every F-bomb there was and I stood in front of the class and I read it with gusto.”

“After class” were the words mouthed to young Hill as he returned to his desk. When class was dismissed, he awaited his reprimanding.

What followed, however, was an invitation to the afternoon’s auditions for the high school play, which Hill wanted nothing to do with. Except, after a few hallway fly-bys, Hill noticed a classroom filled with high school girls.

“They had to cast me. I was the only guy,” Hill said, who ditched his gang-banger friends and joined the drama class. “It changed my life entirely.”

According to Hill, joining theater in high school is considered late in many circles, but following graduation, he was determined to make a career out of his newfound passion and enrolled as an art major in college. With four credits left to graduate, Hill decided to drop out in favor of paid gigs, touring the country as an actor, but soon found that touring was not his cup of tea.

“You work for two and a half hours a night, and the rest of the time, you’re in a hotel room in a strange city,” he said.

With only so many matinees to attend and museums to wander through, when Hill stepped off the tour bus, he was determined to start his career in directing.

Better Call Peter

After more than 20 years serving award-winning directorial roles around Phoenix including The Ala Carte Players, Phoenix Theater and Copperstate Dinner Theater, Hill was tapped to direct a play at the Fountain Hills Community Theater, an up-and-coming East Valley theater which, at the time, was performing at the McDowell Mountain Elementary School.

30 years ago, the theater was rehearsing “Little Shop of Horrors” when the director suddenly disappeared, leaving the show without a rutter.

Like a scene out of a Vince Gilligan script, “They found his car in the desert and discovered he’d been embezzling at his business,” Hill said.

An actor in “Little Shop of Horrors” was a friend of Hill’s who asked if he was available for the abruptly open position.

“So, I came out and directed it and it was a ball…and then they asked me again the next year if I would direct something and pretty soon, I was just constantly here,” Hill said.

Hill was the first employee to be hired when the theater eventually moved into its current location on Saguaro Boulevard, which previously housed the Fountain Hills Library and Community Center.

Work ‘Unicorn’

Transitioning from a part-time directorial role to a full-time position, Hill moved from Downtown Phoenix to Fountain Hills with his wife, actor, dancer and choreographer, Noel Irick. Now, living only 30 seconds from the theater, Hill says the commute is great for work but terrible when anything goes wrong.

A typical day for Hill starts around 10 a.m. and finishes around 10 or 11 p.m. For a director without a college degree, Hill blazed his own path with an exceptional track record of theatrical stewardship, garnering dozens of ariZoni awards for theatrical excellence and several other awards for his work as director, designer and actor.

In his circles, Hill is known as a “unicorn,” designing and building the sets, picking the seasons, hiring directors, hanging the lights, acting in plays and even running the sewing machine.

“I would build the set with the box office phone in my back pocket, so I’d be up on the ladder going ‘Yeah, okay, how many tickets?’” Hill said. “When I leave, they're going to have to hire two or three people to do the stuff that I know how to do.”

For his work, Hill says he gets inspiration from attending shows around the Valley, and before the pandemic, traveling East to see what was happening on the big stage in New York. Most of all, Hill credits his English teacher for changing his life.

“He’s the reason. Otherwise, I’d be in jail, no question,” Hill said, who developed a close friendship with his former teacher before his passing.

Despite the grueling schedule, when asked about his plans for the future, Hill says he’s hoping to keep this up as long as he can.

“I’m getting to be an older guy now, but I don’t think I’ve lost a step,” he said.