Like many young graduates, Joseph Sheridan, a Reynoldsburg native, had dreams and aspirations. In 2019, he graduated from Columbus Bishop Hartley High School and later earned a degree from Miami University in theater and arts management and entrepreneurship.
He had a passion for developing plays.
In college, Sheridan spent time performing, writing, managing and directing. After graduation, he spent a year in an interdisciplinary theater apprenticeship at Commonweal Theatre Company in Minnesota. He developed skills self-producing theater.
His work behind the scenes is now front and center. Sheridan’s first professionally produced musical, “The Road to Damascus,” is currently featured in the Columbus diocese at Ohio Star Theater in Sugarcreek near New Philadelphia.
The play began running in May and will be performed through Tuesday, Nov. 4.
Ohio Star features a musical every year for about six months. Sheridan began as an actor at the theater.
“I got a call back at the United Professional Theatre Auditions for Ohio Star Theater,” he recalled. “I never thought that I would wind up at a company doing Christian theater.”
Yet, God had other plans.
There was a time Ohio Star did not produce theatrical work. It contracted with Blue Gate Musicals, which produced musicals there.
“They did Amish romance musicals, but the Amish really didn’t care for the Amish romance musicals because it was about the Amish but didn’t really involve the Amish,” Sheridan explained.
“They didn’t think it was a very good representation of them. They wouldn’t come and see the shows.”
The theater switched to Bible-based musicals, beginning with one from Sight & Sound Theatres based in Pennsylvania and Missouri.
Sight & Sound licensed a show to Ohio Star. After one season, the professional partnership was discontinued.
Ohio Star considered producing an original musical. In August 2024, artistic director Tammie McKenzie contacted Sheridan.
“She reached out to me because she had found out that I was a writer, that I was involved in new work development and said, ‘Hey, do you have any interest in writing a show for Ohio Star?’” he recounted.
“And I said, ‘Yes, I am absolutely the most interested in that I have ever been.’”
The theater’s first original play was based on the Acts of the Apostles in the New Testament.
“I remember hearing one of my pastors say – when I was in high school – that the book of Acts reads like fiction,” Sheridan recalled.
“It is a very high-intensity, high-energy book of the Bible and is an entertaining read if you just sit down from start to finish. I was like, I haven’t read through all of Acts before just start to finish, and I read it, and I was like, yeah, there’s a lot here.”
Ohio Star wanted to produce the show in 2025, but it required a quick turnaround. Sheridan collaborated with a lyricist and composer.
“The three of us put together the show ‘The Road to Damascus’ based on the book of Acts in about 10 weeks,” Sheridan said, “and it’s now been playing here in Sugarcreek for over 100 performances.”
The musical includes 22 actors, 13 men and nine women. When writing the show, Sheridan drew from his Catholic roots.
He had several years of Catholic formation under his belt from his childhood years at Reynoldsburg St. Pius X School and Bishop Hartley. Writing ‘The Road to Damascus” was largely influenced by his time there.
“I attribute a lot of it to my Catholic education and learning how to read the Bible in a way that was able to help me extract more meaning from the story,” Sheridan said.
“When I was at Bishop Hartley, I learned from my religion teacher, Mrs. Tera Chun. She was a big influence on me and how to read the Bible.”
In high school, Sheridan spent time researching Bible translations and its contributing sources.
“That toolkit that was given to me by my Catholic education was invaluable in the development of the story of the play,” he said.
He wanted to ensure his writing was theologically accurate.
“In a musical, you have to take some dramatic license, but we also want to make sure that we’re doing right by the Biblical stories,” he said. “Getting it wrong would be not only disastrous to people’s perception of the play but also just wouldn’t sit right with any of us if we felt like we weren’t doing the Biblical text justice.”
Acts of the Apostles includes 28 chapters. Due to time restraint, the musical focuses on the first half of the book through chapter 12.
“We had this framing device where we’re going back and forth between the shipwreck that happens at the end of the Acts of the Apostles with Paul on the way to Rome and finding that driving force within Paul,” Sheridan explained.
“The show is trying to make the plot feel as continuous as possible, despite knowing that we have some greater stretches of time in between.”
The show begins with Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit descended upon the Blessed Mother and 12 Apostles who were gathered in the Upper Room in Jerusalem.
The musical covers the arrest of the Apostles and stoning of St. Stephen, the first martyr.
It showcases Peter, who Jesus declared as the rock upon which He would build His Church, and Saul’s conversion as Paul, when he was knocked off his horse and blinded enroute to the city of Damascus.
An intermission is held between Act I and Act II. The play breaks as Saul is blinded on the road. Act II focuses on Paul post-conversion as a disciple after persecuting Christians.
Due to the musical’s success, Sheridan and the creative team were asked back for another musical.
Sheridan’s next show will be “Elijah: Prophet of Fire,” based on the prophet Elijah in the Old Testament. It will premier in May 2026 and run through November 2026.
Tickets to “The Road to Damascus” are available for purchase on the Ohio Star Theater website: AudienceView Professional.
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